Kirkbride Buildings - Historic Insane Asylum Architecture

Looks like Massachusetts is planning to proceed with demolition of the entire Worcester State Hospital admin (including the clock tower), and construction of a replica clock tower using material from the original building. See this official report dated Friday, January 20, 2012. It’s a lengthy, wordy document which is painful to read in some respects, but the overall gist is their intent is to completely raze the admin and build a clock tower replica. They acknowledge strong community support for preservation, but say the cost is just too high.

While destruction of the clocktower is tragic and more should have been done to save it, there’s some small comfort in the fact that part of the reason this is happening is because of the new hospital building being built nearby. The advancement of care for the mentally ill should always trump preservation and memorialization, no matter how important the latter two are. While I don’t think that fully excuses the state from responsibility for this tragedy, it’s at least something of a silver lining.

Things are looking bleak for the Worcester Kirkbride Clock Tower. Even though the structure avoided demolition when the state razed the rest of the building’s remains just three years ago, its days are now numbered. According to a post on the Save Worcester State Hospital Clock Tower Facebook page, Massachusetts is planning to demolish the building due to a lack of funds or interest in reusing it.

I encourage everyone interested in saving the Clock Tower to read the post, like the Save Worcester State Hospital Clock Tower Facebook page, and to share any thoughts you might have on the subject there.

According to an article in the Topeka Capital Journal, demolition of the admin building at the former Topeka State Hospital (all that remains of its Kirkbride building) is scheduled to begin on or before June 1st. The building is only being torn down because of its dilapidated condition. There are no plans for using the space on which it currently stands. Read the article here: End Nears for TSH Building.

I haven’t been down to Taunton to see the old Kirkbride in a long time now. I wanted to pretend that the demolition going on there isn’t happening, and that the building is still standing untouched and quietly beautiful as ever. But of course I wasn’t going to be able to avoid reality forever thanks to the internet. Some photos of the demolition are available here: I Less-than-Heart Massachusetts. Although I suspect the writer’s claim to have taken the very last pictures of TSH may be a little premature, it does look like the Kirkbride is pretty close to being a memory, if it isn’t already.

Over the weekend I stopped off at Worcester State Hospital to check out the demolition work. There’s still a good portion of the wing standing, but I was surprised at how much is gone. Gage Hall (the non-freestanding rotunda) and the section I believe was named Lincoln are mostly rubble.

Oddly, the building seems much bigger with those pieces gone. I guess it has to do with how those parts blocked the view of the rest of the building from certain angles. Anyway, it won’t be long before the whole thing is gone. See it while you can. (more…)

The abandoned buildings at Worcester State Hospital could start coming down as soon as this week according to the Worcester Telegram & Gazette. Reporter Lee Hammel writes about the possible scaling back of the proposed new hospital facility, and mentions a few facts about demolition and the unclear fate of the Clocktower. (more…)

The blogging Worcester taxi driver at Wormtown Taxi promises to post pictures of Worcester State Hospital demo work as it unfolds. This might be a good resource for those of you outside Massachusetts.

I’ve received confirmation from a respectable source: demolition at Worcester State Hospital will definitely take place this Spring. Not only that but portions of what used to be the Kirkbride will be taken down. Demolition is scheduled to start March 31st and everything but the Clocktower and Hooper rotunda (the one closest to the functioning buildings) will be destroyed.

This is sad news, but not completely unexpected.