St. Elizabeths Hospital was founded in August 1852 when the United States Congress appropriated $100,000 to construct a hospital in Washington, D.C., to provide care for indigent residents of the District of Columbia and members of the U.S. Army and Navy with brain illnesses.

At one time, a quarantine hospital separating infected individuals from the general public, the island hid away one of the most infamous carriers of typhoid fever, Typhoid Mary. Join me as I venture onto the island to see what remains.

Opened in 1963, this Queen’s borough hospital served the community for over 40 years, closing for good in 2008. Fighting to keep the hospital open, however, in the end, the state revoked their operating license as one of the only privately owned hospitals in the city.

The architect firm of Harbeson, Hough, Livingston, and Larson was hired by the state to design a new psychiatric hospital in the East Falls section of Philadelphia. Built on a spraling 14 acres and standing 12 floors above ground this modernism high-rise now sits looming in the distance and its future unknown.

While unfortunately by the time I got to Embreeville most of it has been emptied to start the demolition of this vast hospital complex. After exploring 5 buildings and over a mile of underground tunnels still has no idea the size of this place.