Henryton State Hospital
A panorama of Henryton State Hospital taken in its final years shows how ban the vandalism had become.
Updated July 24, 2019 | By Matthew Christopher
Henryton State Hospital was originally founded in 1918 as the Maryland Tuberculosis Sanatorium for African-Americans, and later was renamed Henryton Sanatorium. Around 1962 it was converted to a state hospital that could accommodate 400 patients. It closed in 1985 and during the years that followed became a popular place for locals, ghost hunters, and urban explorers to hang out. While the damage to the buildings was nowhere near as severe in 2006 (before the theater burned), during the following years nearly every surface that could be spray painted on or broken was vandalized and multiple fires claimed various sections of the building. Visiting Henryton in the later years was sort of like going to a trashed, surreal park as you might see high school students crossing the nearby river stopping to chat with people riding along on horseback, then find people barbecuing food on a grill they brought on the rooftops of one of the buildings.
Henryton was finally torn down in 2013 in part because the local government had come to consider the constant problems on the property as a nuisance, and while it was arguably the most well-known abandoned location in Maryland, it still had some interesting places hidden away in the buildings. It also was one of the earliest buildings that I explored with the specific intent to photograph it - almost a decade ago at this point. Hard to believe.
My first trip into Henryton State Hospital involved parking across a small river and wading across. I was meeting with another explorer who would become a good friend and travel frequently with over the next two years. I hiked up a hill past the abandoned power plant and saw the relatively large main building in the distance. Even at this point, the vandalism on the site was bad, but nowhere near what it would become in later years. As an example, someone had already thrown the seats off the balcony and out of the windows in the theater - but a year later someone would burn the theater to the ground, stripping the campus of what what arguably its most interesting feature. Nevertheless, despite the periodic holes that had been kicked in the walls or windows that had been smashed, the walls were not covered with graffiti swastikas and penises, and the kitchen (with its rather inexplicable morgue drawers) had not been demolished. In the following years every architectural feature would be torn away or smashed, making Henryton one of the best examples of how publicizing locations on the internet ultimately destroys them.
Henryton State Hospital's theater was one of the first parts of the building to be destroyed; it was set on fire.
It's strange to me, looking back through some of my photographs from this period in Henryton State Hospital's past. It's odd to see walls not covered with spray paint, windows that aren't broken. It's strange to think back to a time when you could go to the campus and not see dozens of people walking around it, drinking beers on the rooftops, playing in the river down the hill from the site. On one hand, I think it's great that many people have the ability to enjoy exploring and walk through abandoned sites at their own discretion, albeit in this case still with the risk of being caught/fined. On the other, it saddens me that respect and responsibility don't matter more to people. Abandoned sites have no real form of protection - from vandalism, from theft, from arson. I wish I could publicize locations of sites and only people who are careful and reverent would visit them, but there is no such filter on the internet. Because of that, I wish all respectful and reverent people could have come to this place and see firsthand the devastation that careless posting of information on message boards and photo sites does. There was a point, long ago, when Henryton was whole.
Visiting Henryton got harder every year. I look back now and think, I should have taken more pictures! Even in its miserable condition, it was still as worthy of documentation as anything. Like many places I've seen get trashed over the years, I start to tell myself that the place I am visiting is too far gone, that with all the vandalism it's not worth it - and to an extent, who knows, maybe that's correct. The question then becomes whether what I'm looking for is a 'pristine' ruin, whether there is merit in photographing an often-photographed place, and perhaps what the usefulness is of showing what really happens as time wears on.
Years after the demolition, I don't have answers. I feel uneasy knowing I could have and perhaps should have done more, but there is also a part of me that knows that if Henryton was still around I still wouldn't go out of my way to return there. The subject of my work is the decline of a space, but on some level I dislike watching it. You always feel like you're losing something, every time you return.
Henryton State Hospital is a chapter in my book, Abandoned America: Age of Consequences.
Buy a signed copy via this link or get it on Amazon using the link below to read more!
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