12/1/2013

Pennhurst State School and Hospital

Pennhurst State School and Hospital

Pennhurst was a large asylum complex built to house mentally ill children by the state of Pennsylvania in 1903. Pennhurst was closed in 1987 and many of the buildings on the campus are badly deteriorated. Pennhurst has become a ghost hunting tourist attraction with guided tours on busses costing $16. The site looks to be very interesting but seemed impossible to safely access without participating in one of the bus tours. All access to Pennhurst is effectively blocked and intimidating no trespassing signs are posted all over the place. There is an operating VA hospital at the entrance of the Pennhurst site and there is nowhere that I could find where one could discretely park and walk in. The tour does sound sort of interesting even though I generally hate that sort of thing. If you do want to take the tour you'll have to coordinate with the tour operators' schedule and navigate their horrible, cheesy, flash website. Tours leave from the charming nearby town of Spring City PA.

More about Pennhurst at the Pennhurst Preservation Alliance.

 

All content on these pages Copyright Mark Hedlund 2012-2019. All rights reserved. Use in school projects and with links on social media is always okay. Please send me an email to request permission for any other use: hedlunch@yahoo.com Non-exclusive commercial publication rights for most photos is $25 per image.