Kings Park Psychiatric Center
by Ed Weidman
Title
Kings Park Psychiatric Center
Artist
Ed Weidman
Medium
Mixed Media - Digital Painting Photographs
Description
The Kings Park Psychiatric Center, known by Kings Park locals as "The Psych Center", is a former state-run psychiatric hospital located in Kings Park, New York. It operated from 1885 until 1996, when the State of New York closed the facility, releasing its few remaining patients or transferring them to the still-operational Pilgrim Psychiatric Center.The Kings Park Psychiatric Center was established in 1885 by Kings County in nearby Suffolk County, adjoining the Society of St. Johnland established by William Augustus Muhlenberg, prior to the consolidation of Kings County with Queens, Manhattan, Staten Island and the Bronx, to form modern New York City. The official name of the hospital in its first 10 years was the Kings County Asylum, taken from the name of the county that Brooklyn occupied. The hospital was revolutionary at the time in the sense that it was a departure from the asylums of folklore, which were overcrowded places where gross human rights abuses often occurred. The asylum, built by Brooklyn to alleviate overcrowding in its own asylums, was a "farm colony" asylum, where patients worked in a variety of farm-related activities, such as feeding livestock and growing food, as this was considered to be a form of therapy.
After World War II, patient populations at Kings Park and the other Long Island asylums increased markedly. In 1954, the patient census at Kings Park topped 9,303, but would begin a steady decline afterward. By the time Kings Park reached its peak patient population, the old "rest and relaxation" philosophy surrounding farming had been succeeded by more invasive techniques of pre-frontal lobotomies and electro-shock therapy. However, those methods were soon abandoned after 1955, following the introduction of Thorazine, the first widely used drug in the treatment of mental illness. As medication made it possible for patients to live normal lives outside of a mental institution, the need for large facilities such as Kings Park diminished, and the patient population began to decrease. In addition, activists worked in legal suits through the 1970s to reduce the patient population in major institutions, arguing that people could better be supported in smaller community centers.
By the early 1990s, the Kings Park Psychiatric Center, as it came to be known, was much reduced. Many of the buildings were shut down or reduced in usage. This included the massive Building 93. By the early 1990s, only the first few floors of the building were in use. While many patients were de-institutionalized and large facilities were closed, there was a shortage of small community centers, which were never developed in the number needed. This resulted in many more mentally ill people being caught up and retained in jails and prisons because of difficulties in dealing with the world. Many of the homeless in urban areas are mentally ill, people with chronic illnesses who have difficulty keeping up with medication regimes or resist them.
In response to the declining patient population, the New York State Office of Mental Health developed plans to close Kings Park as well as another Long Island asylum, the Central Islip Psychiatric Center, in the early 1990s. The plans called for Kings Park and Central Islip to close, and the remaining patients from both facilities to be transferred to the still-operational Pilgrim Psychiatric Center, or be discharged. In the fall of 1996, the plans were implemented. The few remaining patients from Kings Park and Central Islip were transferred to Pilgrim, ending Kings Park's 111-year run.
Since 1996, several proposals regarding the property have come and gone, and numerous developers have attempted to purchase the grounds from New York State. The development proposals have proven to be highly controversial as the former campus contains numerous obstacles to development. The greatest obstacles are several buildings that were demolished into their basements and buried while the hospital was still operating. Asbestos in these buildings was never properly abated. Other areas include buried ash containing unknown materials from the hospital's power generation facilities and asbestos in steam tunnels and remaining buildings. These problems created a fear in the surrounding community that developers will have no choice but to build high-density housing to offset the environmental clean-up costs and return a profit. In the spring of 2000, the waterfront portion of the former campus was reopened as the Nissequogue River State Park, protecting it from development.[citation needed]
Since the hospital closed its doors in 1996, trespassing has become a large problem at KPPC, as enthusiasts of the paranormal, amateur writers, and photographer hobbyists visit the grounds. Additionally, KPPC has a reputation on Long Island as being haunted. Vandalism has increased dramatically in recent years, with the interior of Building 93 and 7 being the focus of heavy graffiti. King's Park Psychiatric Center, A Documentation is an anonymously run website including video images of the buildings' vandalized interiors. Since entering the abandoned buildings is illegal, the property is patrolled jointly by the New York State Park Police and the New York State Office of Mental Health Police, but occasionally, Suffolk County Police, Suffolk County Park Police, and New York State Police can be seen on the grounds.
The 1995 movie Eyes Beyond Seeing, by director Daniel Robert Cohn, was filmed in KPPC's Building 136/137 (old medical/surgical unit) shortly after the building was closed down. The film also contained exterior shots of the famous Building 93 (The 13-story-tall geriatric/ambulatory building), in an attempt to convince viewers that the interior shots were done inside 93. The film starred Keith Hamilton Cobb as a mental patient claiming to be Jesus Christ, and also featured a cameo by Henny Youngman, in his final movie appearance before his death, as a mental patient claiming to be Henny Youngman.
In 2009, Blood Night: The Legend of Mary Hatchet, written and directed by Frank Sabatella, was released. The film tells one version of the urban legend in the form of a ghost story about a patient committed to KPPC.
Building 93 of the psychiatric center was a primary location in the 2010 feature film, Peripheral Vision, a thriller from filmmaker Michael D. D'Andrea.
Kings Park: Stories from an American Mental Institution, a documentary by former patient Lucy Winer about the history and legacy of the facility, was released on DVD and theatrically in 2013
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January 30th, 2017
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