I grew up across the street from byberry from 1961 till 1979, as kids we use to play over in byeberry sometimes we would talk to the patients, we even played baseball with them.
About 20 years ago, many moons after this place was closed and locked up, I explored this place with friends. Late at night, only the light of a flashlight was a portal into this place. Talk about creepy, sad, and scary as fuck. We heard noises above us after we explored the floors above with no one around, but still heard footsteps. Sometimes you'd walk into a room and it would be 25 degrees colder than the hallways. It was an amazing yet freaky experience. I won't even get into how fucking scary the catacombs were.
I lived in the northeast and I remember Burberry my mom was a volunteer there we as young kids would ride through there on our bikes and all the patients would be wondering around in fenced in area's the fields on the grounds grew corn and other crops and there were signs that said not for human consumption ! In the 70s patients who escaped or were let go often wound up in the woods behind archbishop Ryan high school it was really sad
Its sad to say people like me with aspergers a high functioning Autism where it takes time to process information but you can catch on and learn I could have been here may God Bless these people who were to me soldiers that endured places I have a chance today thank you so much today people like me have a fighting chance today
I visited the abandoned Byberry multiple times when I was a child in the 90s... my cousins and I used to play there. And all the teenagers went there to drink or do drugs. Now I'm absolutely horrified that we, or that anyone, ever set foot in that place. Brrrr.
same here we (my so called friends at that time used to go there after it was shut down (abandoned) not to do drugs or drink but just to goof around (have the bajesus scared outta us)..!! 😡 smh (furiously) STUPID of us..!! 😧..!!
My dad worked for Danville State Hospital for 31 years. They started closing State Hospitals during the late 80's. They put many patients in group homes. All in the name of saving the state money. And there was no guarantee they were receiving medication or proper treatment being in a group home or other private facility. Danville State began closing many of it's buildings because the state said they didn't need them anymore. Some of the building were torn down. The last year my dad worked there was 1989. The supervisors were told to fire people if you can find any reason to. By firing people the state didn't have to pay retirement benefits if the people retired before being fired. And they could hire someone at a lower wage. It's all about saving money.
I work in a small group home in the middle of the community. There are 6 residents to 2 houses with 4 staff members each day. The residents are adults with mental and physical disabilities and are very happy.. but maybe thats only in the netherlands. In any case i love my job and the residents so dont say its all bad everywhere please.
I feel such sadness for the people there so many lost at the hands of people who were supposed to care and be nice to those who needed it most may the ones that are lost rest in peace and find love in the hear after may the ones who survived be happy now and loved aman
I have bipolar 2. From personal experience as far as mental health services go, medication alone is not enough. Therapy such as CBT is needed for mood disorders and this takes yrs and costs a lot of money. I have been fortunate enough to have a psychiatrist who only took how much the gov rebate was and did nit charge me out of pocket expenses. and i was in therapy for 3 yrs. This is what people need to change their way of thinking and their copping skills and this is a slow process. Therapy should be free . Only people with mental illness will understand and their families.For our governments it is all about money. my dr told me that some people who had schizophrenia and broiler together were too sick to live out side a mental hospital. They should reintroduce mental hospital with proper treatments and work programs for patients so they gat the proper care and do not feel like they are in a prison.
My Uncle Nicholas DiGiulio was in Byberry he had Parkinson disease in 1940 he died there from running and jumping off a balcony they said he was insane he was not insane he had Parkinson's which he had no control of his nerves that is all he had I believe they killed him
Parkinson's Disease commonly causes hallucinations. So, though your Uncle had Parkinson's, it is possible that he was scared and running from a hallucination. Many people who had organic causes for dementia or related "mental illness" type symptoms (Parkinson's Disease, Huntington's Disease, late-stage Syphilis, Alzheimer's Disease, etc.) were also put into mental asylums.
Regardless of what happened or why, I am sorry to hear that your uncle died in such a traumatic way! That must have been awful for him and for your whole family too.
I'm so sorry for your uncle may he rest in peace you love him and I'm glad he is at peace now and your right they did something horrible around him or to him I'm really feel horrible for what you're going through but maybe you'll feel better knowing we are praying for him in heaven where he is watching over you
my parents were on the commitee that shut down the hospital it was a godawful place and also my Dad was Superintendent of Norristown State Hospital in the 60-70's. Many hospitals were overcrowded and did not get funding so they shut down. Also many lawsuits came about and also the exposure of the bad treatment of patients and rights.
Nikki Gloom I worked at Developmental Enterprises in Norristown from 1979 to 1984 while my now late husband was stationed in Phillie! They employed over 600 mentally and physically handicap in 5 different work sites! I was Vocational Rehab Coordinator during that time!
What did they do to help the people after? Or did they consider their job done after? Considering most of the patients ended up homeless or in jail I think we all know the answer to that.
Its all about money - and always has been. Historically government does not want fund these places properly. They need to be reopened - and funded properly. This is where most of the "homeless" belong.
J Whiskey I couldn't have said it better myself. Agree 100 percent. Since these places got shut down these people have been on the streets. All they needed was proper funding and to be properly staffed with properly trained staff who cared.
Awesome vid! Kudos to yaggy9. This is probably one of the most informative and "real" videos on what Byberry WAS like, up to it's closure. Funny, these same sorts of images would cross my mind, as I was traversing the halls, long after the patients were ousted and moved onto other accommodations. This really captured the "essence" of what led up to making Byberry into what it became after it's closure.
Instead of fixing the problems they closed the hospitals and then patted themselves on the back like they had done something great. In reality they just threw out very mentally ill people that didnt have the resources or support systems they needed. They abandoned these people. They didnt care tho bc they could pretend that all was well bc these people werent in the hospital anymore. The best and right option wouldve been to create a well regulated, safe hospital for them to be in. One that met their needs, protected them, and gave them a stable life. No one wanted to bother with that tho. It was either all or nothing. Both sides of the debate failed these sick people.
We wouldn’t need to put such places if the general public would treat these people like actual human beings. Right now I am in a wheelchair, and if most of the public had their way, I would be in a place like this or Pennhurst or Willowbrook out of sight out of mind because no one wants to work at my wheelchair. Bigotry towards my wheelchair and other such things are why state cost so much to pay for these institutions how about we just give up the bigotry in the able ism?
Everyone needs a purpose to exist, without that we all have very poor outcomes in life I have been a dual qualified nurse for over 33 years. If we don't know why we need to get up in the morning, then those of us, more vulnerable, would choose not to. Every life matters, we will all die... But it matters how we get there. Pain is what the patient says it is. X
My grandmother spent many years at Byberry on and off in the 70s and 80s. She always said she knew something was wrong within her and that she needed real help, but that's NOT what she received there. All my Aunts said that place broke a beautiful and loving spirit, while acknowledging the family didn't have the resources to care for her. Lots of families were stuck in that situation.
I don't understand how in the beginning they say "Philadelphia will be the only hospital without access to a state mental hospital" while Friends hospital and Belmont had been open for decades.
Hmmm. In 1998, after a breakdown and diagnosis of bipolar and anxiety, I was given the clothes I arrived in, a Metrocard, a week’s worth of meds, and an appointment with the outpatient clinic. No progress in 45 years?
I worked nearby at Eastland Print shop and would grab a slice at a nearby pizza place and eat parked beside Byberry. Erie. One foggy winter day I watched crows appear and disappear out of the fog surrounding the buildings. Creepy memory.
Hearing stories of my parents sneaking around this hospital, hiding from cops that were tryna get trespassers from coming in and snooping, finding brain remains and things fermented in jars and bloody hospital beds is just crazy to me.
Am I the only one who questions how we are to believe we had enough money to build hundreds of these picturesque complexes found literally all over America in the later 1880 but not enough money to staff them a few years later? We can't even build a new building on a University nowadays to compare in the beauty of the architecture of any older asylum. So many questions people need to ask about this topic and era in general. It is said 1 in 20 people were admitted to one of these at one point. Political motives and dissent were all it took. Someone could just call you a lepar and you were not to be seen again. Those who don't know their past are doomed to repeat it. In world where our history is so blatantly obfuscated and people eat whatever story is served to them and go back for more should cause serious concern for any astute person looking forward.
Just like everything else Philadelphia, Byberry was the victim of political corruption. Those who were responsible for the neglect and suffering should burn in the worst part of hell forever. I know what mental illness is like and have suffered most of my life with depression and anxiety.
this reminds me on an old episode of "the twilight show well the begining does at least or that scene in "men in black 2" where they go to that old video rental place and find that tape of things the government tried to keep secret so they could get kay's memory back after he had been "neurolized" (neuralized) smh.. !!
My dad is a Korean War veteran he did not have any kind of mental illness but when he did get sick he was in the military Hospital the VA and we had to go in and give my dad a bath the nurses did not do their job like they should have pissed us off the military should be number one taking care of before anybody else Huntington West Virginia
I was in pennhurst from 1969 to 1972 was there the news like my grandma know to come and get was nude electric shock and thorazin from one year when the state came to check on us some Kidd's where in the tunnel and keep quit tell they left but I'll never forget that
The issue is always money any time the government needs to make cuts its the social & welfare funds first. They never cut military or corporate welfare. We have to demand funds are distributed to programs for downtrodden people not the rich and corporations.
I suffer from mentle illness due to 38 years of abuse from my entire family and numerous so called freind and girl friends It was so bad i thought afgainistan was a vacation Now i have a wife that is truly helping me recovere and helping me heal Most of the time there is no happy ending for us and this is why we're called mentally week .devent and sick and no one cares this is an example of why
I grew up in the neighborhood when they released all the patients we didn’t know this happened. We would always hang out in the woods by a fire and we would see them running around the woods, which scared the shit out of us. One lady would run around naked, one of them came up to us and asked us for a beer, sat down next to us and told us the horrors that she endured in the place like self abortions, don’t know how much of it was true, but it was truly disturbing. Even then we thought hell on responsible it was for them to just let these poor people out into the world.
Hung out here in the late 80s at night with friends from philly and friend from where i was from, it was both scary and exciting! To go into the tunnel of hell with a lighter, drink beer, and have fires in and outside. ... memories...
@@frostbite3318 it is a phrase in the disabled communities that started in the late 70s, stating that, dont make choices for us, or decide our lives without our input, work WITH the client , listen and pay attention to the client, and help them with their goals, but that rarely happens, its all on paper., not so much in practice when it comes to the DDMR groups, but with the physically disabled, while not perfect, thats become more the norm.
Hi byberry Frank here, from Philly. On behalf of the people of Philadelphia, we miss you very much. Mental health is worse now and the homes they built on the location are ugly. Anyway as I was saying mental health is worse now, we now have 10,00 genders, feminist, liberals and furries. Please come back and save us. Thank you Love Frank
nope sorry the residents of pennsylvania do have an alternitave mental hospital to be sent to it's called "norristown state hospital " 😧😡 smh.. (furiously)
I had tried to take my own life several times so I waz supposed to go to 1 Maine State hospitals but their doors were closed because of full capacity so I was diverted to a private Psychiatric Hospital call Jackson Brook Institute formally known as JBI I waz there almost 3 months. In 2002 they close their doors and Maine Medical Center built in your hospital in Westbrook Maine called Spring Harbor Hospital but I never went to that hospital.
that remotivation therapy was actually pretty genius. it seems so silly but something as simple as that helps people feel more grounded. doesnt need to be said that the state hospitals needed to be shut but we have barely changed. people don't get warehoused anymore, they just get an appointment with outpatient even if they need more supportive help. there's nowhere for us to go. there's nowhere for us to turn. everyone still treats us like crap. abuse of a different kind is at an all time high, negligent disregard for the wellbeing of patients due to a high number of med professionals into it only for the money. same shit, different day
Having dealt with mentally ill patients in hospital settings, I can remember back in 1980's when Reagan cut funding but as this documentary shows, Kennedy was the one that began the problem and democrats have never done anything to change that.
I did see the video, all of it, on I believe it was Dailymotion. It appeared complete when I watched it. Are you allowing users to dl parts one & two? I would like to dl the whole thing and I know that YT has some capability with that, if the user, who uled the video(s), allows it to be shared that way. I also didn't see the ability to dl videos at all on Dailymotion when I watched it initially.
gov worker- oh you treating the patients bad? well were gonna shut the whole place down. now where will you work, huh? HUH?? orderly- but sir, whats gonna happen to the patients? gov worker- eh?? what was that?? patients you say??? orderly- yeah the patients. where will they go once youve closed down the place? gov worker- woa... easy now.... they want us to shut down the asylums so thats what were gonna do! the patients will be free to do whatever they want! this is america! you gotta forge your own path here. cant be waiting around for somebody to hold your hand. you need to leave the thinking up to the experts and start figuring out where your next job is gonna be, buster. now get outta my FACE.
okay this is the cold hard facts mental hospitals cost money yes but its not the communities problem why dont the parents take care of the kids they had so everyone else doesnt have to foot the bill its not society fault that these people are ill
![Final Asylum: The Closing of Philadelphia State Hospital (Part 1) [a.k.a. Byberry]](/img/logo.svg){kind=logo}
