An Abandoned Hospital in New York City

I have always found abandoned places fascinating, and beautiful in their own way. There’s something meaningful in what you can tell from the debris left behind by previous inhabitants. Exploring these places usually creates more questions than answers, and inspires in me a stirring of the imagination that is harder to find the further I get from childhood.

When I was living in Sydney, I walked past an abandoned house on my way to work, and knew I wanted to take a look. So I told Tom, always up for an adventure, and we checked it out. It didn’t disappoint. An overgrown lawn, a wooden heart-shaped decoration amongst the rubble, a broken mirror. Room after room of crumbled memories.

So when I heard that there was an abandoned hospital in the middle of NYC on an easily accessible island, I was immediately curious. 

Roosevelt Island is a narrow piece of land, about 2 miles long, between Manhattan and Queens. You can easily get the subway or an amazing view from the aerial cable car to it from Manhattan. The cable car is the same cost as a subway ride, or free if you have an unlimited metrocard. Incredibly, no one had mentioned this hidden gem to us before. 

Roosevelt Island has always been used for public services: a jail, a lunatic asylum, hospitals. But now, the last public building, the former Coler-Goldwater Hospital, has been sold off. We were lucky enough to see it before it is demolished. More on that later.

The stunning view from the aerial cable car, with Roosevelt Island on the right and Manhattan on the left.

During the 1800s, the island was known as Blackwell’s Island and there was a mental asylum there known as the New York City Lunatic Asylum. At this time, an intriguing journalist named Elizabeth Cochrane (pen name Nellie Bly) feigned insanity in order to report first-hand on the poor treatment of women in the facility. She spent ten days there, and her eye-opening article (read from Chapter VIII on about the asylum), published in World, led to New York City spending a million dollars more each year on ‘the insane’.  She wrote:

“The insane asylum on Blackwell's Island is a human rat-trap. It is easy to get in, but once there it is impossible to get out.”

The extremely ballsy Nellie Bly.

Luckily, she did get out. Unfortunately, the women she met (many of whom she felt were as sane as she was) were not so lucky. Her account of life in the asylum is horrific. Charles Dickens, who visited Roosevelt Island in 1842, said of it:

“everything had a lounging, listless, madhouse air, which was very painful”

While nothing of the asylum still stands except for the Octagon Tower, we were able to walk around the abandoned hospital, most recently known as Coler-Goldwater Hospital undisturbed. 

The hospital opened in 1939, originally as the Welfare Hospital for Chronic Disease. We learned, while researching online. that it was a dismal place that people only went as a last resort. It is likely that people came here not expecting to leave, and with no money to support themselves if they did. 

We had the opportunity to walk around the grounds and take photos undisturbed.

Approaching the empty buildings.

The entry to an courtyard with an apocalyptic atmosphere.

The rooms inside had no furnishings, such as beds, but still had sinks, and some posters on the walls.

Long forgotten bikes... feel free to speculate on their owners' whereabouts.

The poster on the window, masked by the tree's shadow, reads "Every patient deserves pain management".

At this point, we ran into a security guard who had been hired by a company that had recently bought the land. He explained that they are planning to knock it down soon, and build a medical research facility. 

The guard told us it's extremely unnerving to be there at night, especially with the mortuary down in the basement. 

"My boss sometimes calls me up to do a double shift and I hang up on him. It's creepy as hell here at night."

We tried our best to convince him to let us inside, but he said he was under strict orders to keep everyone out. Furthermore, he couldn't fathom why we would want to spend any time in such a miserable place. Fortunately for us, he hadn't seen us earlier trying our best to get a window open and get inside (we failed).

Trying to find a way in.

I'm glad I got to see this place before it's demolished. 

We checked out the memorial for F. D. Roosevelt, and the wind nearly sent us into the East River. Shivering with cold, we made our way to the cable car.

On our way back: the aerial cable car view over 2nd Ave, Manhattan.

There is a lot of history on this island. Although some terrible things happened here, or perhaps because of this, I think it should be remembered.

What do you think of abandoned places? Creepy as hell or fascinating? Share your thoughts below.