5. Middletown State Homeopathic Hospital, Middletown, New York
The Middletown State Homeopathic Hospital is located in Middletown, New York. The facility first opened in 1874. At the time of its opening, it was the country’s first purely homeopathic hospital for mental disorders, which meant that the facility was home to many new techniques that were deemed obscure. Patients were treated with art activities, an institutional newsletter written by the patients themselves, strict dietary regiments, and most famously, baseball.
The hospital’s baseball team, the Middletown Asylums, began playing in 1889 and eventually began squared off against some of the region’s best teams, including the New York Giants. Some of the team’s players even went on to play in the majors. The hospital was eventually closed in 2006 and was left abandoned.
The Main Building of the abandoned hospital from 1874 no longer exists, and many other structures have been lost to fire and demolition. However, many buildings are still standing and being adapted for modern use. The former hospital campus is now home to the headquarters of the Cornell Cooperative Extension and the Fei Tian College and Academy of the Arts while other structures remain neglected.