Western State Hospital in ruins

This is Western State Hospital (mental hospital) in Lakewood, WA. It was nearly demolished and now serves as a place for people to hang out, party and paint graffiti... Some of the graffiti is cool though. I'm not sure why it was only partially demolished. They built a new Western State Hospital near by.

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• insane
• asylum
• mental
• hospital
• Western
• State
• Hospital

[Ullric]

i used to spend a lot of time up there. once you get use to it its not as bad as it sounds. As far as it being haunted nothing happened to me my friends or anyone i knew who frequented the place...ever. no demons nothing. a occasional drunk guy maybe. Not doubting your story or anything but nothing dangerous up there.

And as of now it has been completely torn down and made into a memorial/park attraction.

[lrm130]

yes, i saw the memorial, it is all flat there now, kinda creepy...

[OneDogWindows]

@ShawRoadProductions Yeah!  Hmmmm....

[kmenard32]

This is not the old Western State Hospital. The old one still stands. This is the Hill's Ward that housed the workers. NOT the insane.

[crissangel202]

This is probably the only story that makes lakewood anything close to interesting

i unfortunaly never got to see the building when it was like this(Being that im only 14)

now its nothing but a memorial, does anybody know what that underground tunnle was ever created for?

ya know the one that leads from the new hospital into the park, thats built right under the street, iv always wanted to know what its purpose was.

[ShawRoadProductions]

anyone catch the window at about :10 seconds in? just another explorer or...?

[The7thCircuit]

@Ullric

if you ever went there (or even the park mind you) alone at night, you realized you were never alone...

[Turizzle]

Wow, to think back to when my friends and I would sit on the upper floors in the ruins. Just to chill. Its a shame they completed tearing the place down and put up the memorial. I think the building meant more while it was still partially standing. Those of you who claim demons followed you home? I cannot personally account for those stories, but anyone who frequented the place knew the ones who did live there previously were well-mannered and wouldn't mean to bring harm. Just ill-minded..

[ballztothewall69]

@Combella its a memorial now..i work at western state as an mental health technician and the hill ward was a dorm for the patients that worked on the farm which is now what we consider ft. steilacoom park!

[Combella]

Went to this place last night. It looks nothing like this now. Just a slab of concrete.

[theseeker2001]

This thing was like an indoor amusement park back then - times were good - we would go get TV tubes from the Manley's - anyone have a time machine handy I'm having a flashback! Life was pretty simple in Lakewood back then.

[theseeker2001]

Used to play in this when I was in 3rd to 5th grade (79-81) or so. At that time, it was largely standing w/multiple floors. Old springy rusty iron beds inside, a couple of very small rooms we couldn't imagine what they were for! Lots of pentagrams spray painted inside, the boiler room below of course. Always had to keep watch for the older "bad" kids! Anyways, what I see here looks like a ruin compared to what it was when I was a kid, when did they knock most of this down to this level?