Location: 4400 Paralee Lane, Louisville, KY Map
Ghost and
visitor tours of Waverly Hills Sanatorium:
Tel. 502 933 2142
Office open: Mon- Fri
9am- 5pm (closed 1- 2pm) EST
Wed 9am-
1pm EST
https://www.therealwaverlyhills.com/
Waverly Hills Sanatorium located in Louisville, Kentucky, USA,
was built in 1908 and opened two years later as a hospital to treat
tuberculosis patients.
In the early 20th century, an epidemic
of tuberculosis broke out in Jefferson County. Initially, a building
was built for about one hundred and forty patients. As the epidemic
spread, a larger hospital was needed. In March 1924, construction
began on a new five-story building that could accommodate over four
hundred patients. The building was opened on October 17, 1926. The
hospital was closed in June 1961.
One of the most well-known
legends of Waverly Hills is the story of Room 502. It tells of a
nurse who committed suicide by hanging in this very room. A few
years later, another nurse jumped off the roof of a building because
she was already infected with tuberculosis and found out she was
pregnant, and out of wedlock. Another story is the Death Tunnel -
the tunnel of death. It is a tunnel that was built to remove the
corpses of deceased patients and hide them from other patients as
well as from the world. The harvest of the epidemic was removed and
kept from the regulars of Waverly Hills, so as not to incite panic
in them. In the hospital, medical experiments were performed on
patients.
Waverly Hills has undergone restoration work and is
open to the public.
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Waverly Hills has a long and colorful history. Unlike other buildinds after its closure the sanatorium seems to have a history of its own despite decades of neglect.
The name of the Waverly Hills Sanatorium dates back to 1883 when Major Thomas H. Hays bought his family a vast estate on the grounds of the future Waverly Hills Sanatorium. Back then the area of Waverly Hills was not heavily settled. Rolling meadows and forests covered hills surrounded the former private residence of Major Hays. His kids were home schooled due to the remoteness of their estate from other settlements. Eventually a separate building for a home school was constructed on Page Lane. Major Hays also hired a local woman Lizzie Lee Harris to teach his kids. She apparently was very fond of Walter Scott and literature in general. She even named a small one room school house, that was constructed by the orders of the Major, Waverley School after one of Walter Scott's novels and its protagonist Edward Waverley. Major Hays like the name and renamed his whole estate into a Waverley Hill that later became simply known as Waverly Hills. THe name stuck and later gave a name to a new Tuberculosis hospital knows today as Waverly Hills Sanatorium.
The history of Waverly Hills Sanatorium date back to an act of
the legislature passed in 1906 that reserved these lands for a
hospital for the treatment of tuberculosis. "White Death" as it was
known at the time had no cure. Unfortunately, victims of this
disease would be infected by a Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria.
It would survive inside their lungs in white blood cells known as
macrophages forming large granulomas. During dormant periods,
patients don't suffer or experience any symptoms, but during active
stages, these formations would burst and new bacteria would spread
throughout the organism without warning. Previously healthy
individuals experience weight loss, fever, night sweats, blood
sputum, and many other symptoms. Without adequate antibacterial
treatment, people burned out in a short time and in most cases, they
died. People, suspected of the infection had to be isolated in an
area far from major cities and with plenty of fresh air and
sunlight. Waverly Hills Sanatorium proved as an ideal location for
that.
Most of the residential area that surrounds Waverly
Hills Sanatorium today did not exist at the time. Instead, it was a
fairly extensive expanse of wilderness. In 1907 first tuberculosis
dispensary was opened to accept first patients and just three years
later in 1910 Waverly Hills Sanatorium was opened. It was a fairly
small building with a modest capacity of only 40 patients. That,
however, got filled fairly quickly. On August 31, 1912, all
tuberculosis patients from the City Hospital were moved to a
temporary make-shift camp around Waverly Hills Sanatorium. People
lived in tents for just three months until the new building for
advanced cases was not completed on December 1912. Its capacity
reached 50 people, but it allowed some more free space for incoming
patients. Later the building for advanced cases was turned into a
Colored Hospital for non-white patients of the Waverly Hills
Sanatorium.
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In some cases, kids of the sick patients of Waverly Hills
Sanatorium stayed with other relatives like in case of Hazel Howell
(pictured right, 1891- 1919). This was not the case for everyone,
however. Often families didn't have the financial means or any
relatives so they brought their kids to the sanatorium. In 1914 a
children's pavilion was added that with a total of 50 beds. Growing
number of incoming children forced administration to cut few corners
and add new beds with available space, making live there crowded and
fairly uncomfortable. Additionally the administration of the
hospital opened an open- air school in 1913 to house all the
newcomers and provide them with quality education.
Waverly
Hills Sanatorium grew steadily. New wooden buildings were added to a
medical complex to house all the patients. However the expanses grew
steadily and it became apparent that a new grander brick and
concrete building had to be erected. Number of patients grew
steadily and in 1923 a bond was issued for $1,000,000 for
construction of much larger building for Waverly Hills Sanatorium.
Waverly Hills Sanatorium started its construction in March 1924 and
was opened on October 17, 1926. The new five- story building replaced
the old hospital (opened on July 26, 1910). Swampy areas around
Louisville, Kentucky offered a great location for the spread of
tuberculosis bacteria and thus the disease became almost an epidemic.
Waverly Hills Sanatorium construction was thought to be
state-of-the-art of its own time and incorporated theories that were
widely spread at the time. It was widely believed that TB can be cured
by sun exposure and plenty of fresh air. Architects of Waverly Hills
James J Gaffney (1863- 1946) and Dennix Xavier Murphy (1854- 1933) took
this into a consideration. The bat-like structure of the building was
designed so that it followed the natural wind patterns of the area and
did not block it. Most of the windows had no glass and instead had
meshed screens that allowed sun inside the building. The building
Waverly Hills was five stories high and contained about 400 rooms for
the patients. Corridor that runs through the middle of the levels
allowed access to all rooms in the building. These long halls that
divide the building have wide open rooms on one side and smaller rooms
on the other. Open spacious rooms were made for those who were in the
early stages of the disease. Their beds were wheeled out on the
promenade (shown in the picture) where they lay all day. During winter
they were given blankets, but the rule stayed the same. Plenty of fresh
air was believed to be the only good way to save patients of Waverly
Hills. On the other side of the halls are smaller rooms. They were made
for those who had no chance of survival and were left to die. Patients
were simply transported across the hall from open rooms to more closed
and isolated ones.
Waverly Hills Sanatorium lost its purpose when antibiotic streptomycin was discovered in 1943. This proved to be the best way to fight the infectious disease and soon cases of TB dwindled. The sanatorium was closed in June 1961, but reopened quickly in 1962 as a Woodhaven Geriatrics Hospital. Grim history of the building did not end here. Electroshock therapy was commonly used on senior people to cure some of the disorders that were badly understood at the time. Additionally lack of proper funding decreased overall sanitary conditions of the medical centre. The conditions were so bad and old patients were treated so badly that it was closed in 1981. Remaining citizens were transferred to Hazelwood Centre. The deterioration and overall state of the building was too expansive to restoration and it was closed.
Over the years several people came forward with their ideas
for the abandoned Waverly Hills Sanatorium. Some offered minimum
state prison within its walls. Others suggested erection of huge
statue of Jesus Christ after demolishing a hospital similar to
that in Rio de Janeiro. The last project even had its own
"Christ the Redeemer Foundation Incorporated" organized by
Robert Alberhasky with the help of architect Jasper Ward and
artist Ed Hamilton who designed the sculpture that was supposed
to be the tallest statue of the Savior in the World standing at
incredible 270 feet. No sculpture was ever erected here, but the
main building of Waverly Hills medical complex was badly damaged
as the owner allowed vandals to loot every part of the original
building as they could. Most of the damage you see today in the
eerie hallways and abandoned rooms dates to that period.
Now the property is owned by Tina and Charlie Mattingly and The
Waverly Hills Historical Society since 2001 which offers guided
tours, and half-night and overnight stays within the walls of
Waverly Hills Sanatorium. They plan to remodel the structure and
turn it into a haunted Bed and Breakfast 120-room hotel,
conference center, and restaurant. They fixed some of the
windows, removed asbestos insulation, and secured the exterior
brick sidings, but there is still a lot of work to do to bring
the structure of Waverly Hills to its original appearance.
Fortunately, the haunted guides will still continue after the
complete restoration of a four-star hotel.
The main
building of Waverly Hills Sanatorium was reserved for white
patients. Children were separated and lived in children's units
those cost $153,000 to construct. African American (an obsolete
term used in the documents is Colored) were kept in a separate
Colored unit that was smaller, and less sophisticated at a cost
of $212,000.
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African American Unit Waverly Hills that was known at the time as a Colored Unit was intended to house African- American patients as well as other non- White races. It is clear that "separate, but equal" does not apply here. The building was much smaller with only 50 beds and had less staff. It was originally opened on December 18, 1912 as a building for advanced cases of Tuberculosis. After the main building of Waverly Hills was opened the building was transformed into the Colored Hospital. However the general layout was similar to the main building. Windows were meant to allow fresh air inside the promenade. The original building was replaced by a two story larger hospital. Today both structures have been demolished. Only photos remain. As far as we know no one tried to explore this area for any paranormal activity or strange occurrences.
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Children's unit of the Waverly Hills Sanatorium was opened to house ever growing number of kids in Waverly Hills Sanatorium. Original living headquarters were not enough to fit all the residents so a separate wing was constructed. Many patients had no other options, but to bring their kids here. Unfortunately many healthy newcomers often contracted the deadly disease and themselves became patients in the hospital.
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Ablation of the Phrenic Nerve
Heliotherapy
Thoracoplasty
treatment method for Pneumothorax: artificial, using specific equipment
to cause the affected lung to collapse and thus prevent the disease from
getting worse (according to the state of medical knowledge at the time).
Finally, the Sanatorium simply offered patients to take "good air,
good food" cures under the supervision of competent medical personnel.
The plans were designed by architects James J. Gaffney and Xavier Murphy.
The first building was
completed on December 21, 1912, it included an administrative building
and two pavilions on either side of the main building. Forty patients
could be accommodated there.
The administrative staff at the time
included a doctor, a nurse and three student nurses. On the first floor
of the main building were offices, the pharmacy, a classroom and
laboratories. The upper floor was the nurses' living area.
Somewhat overwhelmed by the scale of the epidemic, the hospital
expanded, first in 1915, a pavilion with a library and play area for
children; then by major works begun in March 1924 to raise the building
to five floors. The new sanatorium was opened on October 17, 1926.
Woodhaven Geriatrics Hospital
The
buildings were reopened in 1962 as Woodhaven Geriatrics hospital as a
geriatric hospital, but following numerous complaints of patient
mistreatment, the hospital was forced to close permanently in 1981.
Urban legends were born at that time, suggesting that the place had
become an asylum for the insane and the insane.
Two
years after Woodhaven closed in 1983, the estate was bought by Clifford
Todd, who wanted to make it a state prison.
This project was a
failure in particular because it ran up against the opposition of local
residents; and to bail out, Clifford Todd tried to make it a residence
with apartments: it was a failure for lack of sufficient funds to mount
the operation.
In 1996, Robert Alberhasky had the
idea of a two-part project for Waverly hills. The first phase would
consist of erecting a 46 m high statue there, a statue representing
Christ the Savior, like the famous statue of Christ the Redeemer in Rio
de Janeiro in Brazil.
The second phase of the project, meanwhile,
was much more mercantile: a chapel, a souvenir shop, stalls were to be
built there.
Once again, and like all the other projects before,
it was a failure. The owner thus let the buildings deteriorate over
time, even leaving the building at the mercy of vandals who ransacked
the interior of the premises.
After a year of operation, and in
order to recover his stake, Alberhasky tried to destroy the buildings by
mining the base of the building to shave it, in the hope of reselling
the land for a good price.
It was stopped by a court conviction
at the request of the National Register of Historic Places, the
equivalent of the French National Commission for Historic Monuments.
In 2001, new owners, Charlie and Tina Mattingly, bought the house and
planned to transform the place into a luxurious 4-star hotel.
Today, Waverly Hills Sanatorium is being restored by its current owner.
It offers a variety of tours and stays at the sanatorium, commercially
exploiting the "haunted place" aspect to attract paranormal
investigators or simply curious people.
What is true :
Faced with the rise in mortality
within the hospital, it was decided to build a tunnel called Body Chute
or Death tunnel (“Tunnel of death”), intended for the collection of
corpses.
The bodies were transported at night so as not to frighten the patients. The title of the horror film "Death tunnel" refers to this famous tunnel (the filming took place in the hospital and in the tunnel).
One of the best-known legends of the sanatorium is that of room 502,
located on the fifth floor. This tells that two nurses from the
sanatorium committed suicide in this room, one aged 29 would have hanged
herself in 1928 because she was pregnant following a relationship with
the director of the hospital but not married, which was frowned upon at
the time; and moreover in turn suffering from tuberculosis. [ref.
necessary] The other, for no known reason, would have jumped out of the
window, into the arms of Bonaventura, who failed to catch her, which
resulted in her death. This one attracted a lot of curious people but
everyone who came in saw shadows moving around the room and heard voices
saying "Get out!"
The rooftop courtyard
It would seem that the
children were singing a song, “ring around the rosie” which means round
on the back of the hand (the children were suffering from tuberculosis)
while making the rounds. Even now, people would testify that they hear
children singing a song on top of this roof.