Bonner Medical

each shot just gets better and better.

My God. It makes me feel so small. The sky over the building is phenomenal. I wish I could have been there with you, even if it was just for this one photograph.

I worked in this building for 12 years - I met some of the nicest people (and the worse) and have learned alot about life, like thank God I could unlock those doors and go home every night. Some patients we treated like family. we were their only link to the outside, some never knew what it was like outside of those walls.. You can't believe some of the stories the old folks told us.

I'm in the process of writing a book about the people I took care of for many years. I don't know if this is the proper place to talk about the poor unfortunate people who lived there.

But you know, you had to know these people and you really understood why parents stopped coming to visit them. The were so burned out from caring for thier mentally ill child for 50 or more years.

Don't blame the parents for giving up..They wanted to live the rest of their lives without the trauma of being beaten by their son or daughter, or have checks and money stolen from them, Some even had to move into elderly housing because because they lost their home to fire or going bankrupt. (sp) because of their child.

Mentally ill people are some of the most selfish people in the world. it is me, myself and I - with no thought of what you are doing to another person..But These people are sick and when you understand what their illness is, then we can try to go ahead and bring some kind of peace to their shreiking voices. and minds .I can tell you about what Danvers State use to be like in the 30-40-50's..THis was when DSH was a self-governing little town of its own. The patients, staff, doctors, nurses, all worked together to make the community work...I know a lot about these times because my Uncle was a patient there during these times...and often at night when all the patients were asleep our nurse would come down and tell what it was like years ago - it was not a pretty place.
One movie you might want to find " The snake Pit" made in 1946. It was made on the grounds of DSH, but most of it was made in Marblehead...tthis is what an insane assylum was like ,My book is going to make" One flew over the cucoos's nest" and Girl interrupted look like a nursery school tale...

The person that made this website is an artist indeed.
BUt perhaps yo can get a picture of the fields and lower road and get a thread going on "Hospital life in he early days" so I don't take all the space here....Sorry I took so long to get back - but these pictures bring back memories for more stories...Even a nice shot of the old castle because this is where I'm going to take you. when it was a thriving self-sustained working community..

This bld Bonner Medical wasn't it used as a detox for years even after the main hospital closed?
I am sure it was used in 1995 or 94
I knew someone who stated there.
It is a site. Never could put words to the
feeling I had when I entered the grounds of the old hospital.

Thank you Mari, it is good to hear from the people that have first hand knowledge of this extrodinary place and some of the history about it too. Look forward to reading your book in future.

Mari I worked there '73 - '75 in the kitchen and housekeeping. Remember the tunnel from the Kirkbride Building to the Bonner Building? We used to push the food trucks thru there every day. I'm sure your book will be HUGE with so much to say. I should write a book and I only worked there 2 years before beginning college. I still can't believe they are tearing this down :(

Mari, the movie was called Home Before Dark. One of the patients told me about how they filmed at Danvers State Hospital 1958. Based on a woman who was from Marblerock (Marblehead MA) and her insanity. There are many outside shots of Danvers State in the movie, you guys should rent it if you can, excellent movie!

ye gods that is beautiful.

When I was a teenager in the 60's we used to drive up to the hospital at night with our friends in the car...I would stall the car out and pretend to not be able to start it back up...It was very creepy with the headlights off and the moonlight shining over the face of the building...The grounds were taken care of and you could drive by the Bonner building and circle back in front of the main building...or drive on the road out back...The bars on the window and the gothic spires were beautiful and scary at the same time..What I didn't know at the time was that my own mother was sent there a few years later and I had to go visit her at the Bonner building...So I have fun and sad memories of the place...I am so happy you took the time to document this place and I found it online...Thank you

When I worked there,During the Summer we would watch thunderstorms approach form th 5th floor Bonner Builing solariums. Usually we could see them coming from the direction of Lawrence. I gotta tell you watching a storm approach from that height can be a spectacular view

I also worked in the Bonner Bldg , I was there for almost 3 yrs. I remember when I started there I worked the over night shift , if I needed a snack or cigarettes, I had to go to the vending machines in the basement .. well to my left were the doors' to the tunnel and let me tell you at 2 in the morning , I would stand there getting what I needed and the whole time the hair on th eback of neck would stand straight up! I stopped being afraid after about 6 months .

Security took myself and another female staff member for a tour of the Kirkbride one evening on our dinner break.

Everything was fine til we entered the kitchen area , all of a sudden there was a blood curdling scream and the 2 security office ran from the building BEFORE my colleague and I got out.

I have never forgotten that sound. Like Mary I have many stories from my time there. I saw some terrible things but I also remember all the good we did.

Just out of the picture, is the Protestant chapel,Nurses home,and the Grey Gables. Did anyone notice,while driving north on Rt.1, that an aircraft arrow and North were painted on the Back side of the Nurses home roof.

As you look at the picture of the building. On the left side of the shot. The top floor. A patient (before I started working there) a patient jumped from the 6th floor solarium window , and hit the ground beside the building. About a 75 foot drop at least. I know this, because I was related to two of the employees on duty, and involved with the situation.

BEAUTIFUL...... yet creepy

Sorry guys but...BONNER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Named for Clarence K. Bonner Superintenden at DSH for many years

i was too at danvers state hospital in the teen ward. i was there for 4 months and i was in there around 1989. I hope to God that noone left my damn records there so others can buy them. How can i find this out. here is my email yayasisterhood72@hotmail.com and here is my myspace name johanna sarrocco/ holman i need to find out if anyone knows how to get a hold of someone to find out info about knowing if my records were involved in selling online. if so how. thanks. It was very very difficult being in danvers. I had no family to come and visit me. I cried alot and I hurt myself and flip out because i didnt want to be there. I feel bad for ANYONE who was there lived and died there. As for friggin families leaving there love one in that rat hole go to hell. you had no idea what those poor kids and adults had to suffer. my god i even had a staff come in my room check to see if i was naked looked under my blanket and when he saw me move he ran off. Now you tell me that was normal for a teen girl to go through and what others had to indure. Im soo sick of hearing about families what they had to go thorugh. they had it made compaired to what these poor people went through. sorry that i dont feel anything for the families but they left their loved ones in that hell. you have no idea what its like to be put in one of those places and no family to visit you. sorry had to vent. i have been in many hospitals from age 13 too my twenties finally im doing great no meds have a husband and work as a nanny and got my life together. Its only Because of Gods love and others who love me and supported me. i only wish that for the others out there who still hurt and having it rough.

Johanna, Were youa patient of the Department of Youth Services? They had the only teen ward there at Danvers. We rarely had anyone under the age of 18 on the DMH wards. It would have been called Centerpoint. It was located on several floors during my time there I-3, B-3, in the Kirkbride., and 6 East & West in the Bonner building. DYS would be the place to start if you are looking for info about your records. If you were by chance on one of the DMH wards DMH has an Office of Consumer and Ex-patient Relations, they are a good place to start. If they can't directly help they do have a lot of resources to refer you to. Be persistent.

Did they use a crane to demolish the medical building or a wrecking ball?

Personally I bElivieve that is wrong for people to be put in an asylum. they didnt choose to be challenged they were born like that or it came out of the blue either way its pat down from genes given to them from one or both of the parents and i dont understand how people can pretty much cherish the workers, ive read many of patients notes and they werent treated fairly Mari. Ive read that some punishments were to stay in a room with a tub full of water trapped in there for hours. all they had to do it yell or scream. when you are challenged thats what you do its kind of like and instinct. its no one's place to try to chanbge them it how they are and its how they should stay. i ve also read that they had punishments such a thing called pack. wich was described as there was a metal bed in a small room they took mulltiple frozens sheets and wrapped u tightly in them and strapped you on a bed i dont see where that is fair at all.. id love to hear comments back on whether u agree or disagree.

I totally agree but isn't putting someone in a bath called hydrotherpy

It CAN be hydrotherapy, unless your attendant is Norman Bates. :-)

Oh, to be young and idealistic, knowing it all and out to reform the world! Then reality intrudes, and you learn how very little you know :-( (maturity is not when you finally know everything you need to know; it's when you realize how much you have left to learn)

The baths, the wrapping in sheets...we think those are horrible methods today, but at the time when they were in widespread use, they were considered state-of-the-art therapies. Of course, as with anything, there were some staff who used them coercively, as a threat or punishment. As wrong as that was, in most cases it was not because the staff were sadistic. They were overworked, underpaid, inadequately trained, and inadequately supervised.

Involuntary treatment in a locked facility is sometimes required for the safety of the patient and the community. Even in community settings, I have had jobs where I went to work every day knowing that I would be met with what, in any other setting, would be considered a criminal assault. The only question was the form of the assault. It might be having my hair pulled, getting a bite that broke the skin, being kicked, hit, punched, head-butted, pinched, scratched, having my clothing torn, having the interior of my car damaged in the course of transporting a patient, etc. Other patients have assaulted (even murdered) others in much more extreme ways, including arson. We cannot do away with institutions altogether. If we did, the only alternative for some patients would be jail. The symptoms are not the person's fault, but safety must be maintained while treatment alleviates the symptoms.

There are safeguards in place today to guard against "unfair" treatment. Individual program plans, behavior support plans, psychological services, human rights committees, mandatory review of all adverse incidents, oversight by advocates and guardians, required staff training in client rights, sensitivity, abuse and neglect all help to make programs more person-centered/client-focused.

As for leaving people as they are...if all you could do was yell/scream/cry, would that satisfy you??? Wouldn't you want help to teach you additional skills and to help you be more independent? Should we not help a child with autism learn to use a communication device, a picture exchange communication system, or some other means to better express his/her wants and needs? Should we really just say "that's the way he is, we don't want to change it"?

Or someone who has schizophrenia and walks around town all day talking to the voices in his/her head--should be not provide antipsychotic medications in an effort to help the person interact with others, maybe have a job or go to school? Should we really just decide that he should stay that way?

Most people do want treatment to improve their health. If a person has diabetes, does that mean that's how they are, and they should forgo treatment and stay that way? Even when a person doesn't want treatment, sometimes that refusal is a symptom of their illness. Often, people in a manic phase of bipolar disorder feel great--lots of energy, little need for sleep, exaggerated sense of their own abilities, etc. What they don't see is how they are alienating those closest to them by their extreme irritability and/or risky behaviors (spending too much money, driving recklessly, using street drugs, sexual promiscuity, etc.).

If we stipulate that institutions are undesirable, then we, as a society, have to be willing to provide and PAY for the costs of adequate community-based treatment.

Most patients with a mental illness or developmental disability, if they are sufficiently self-aware, do not want to be left as they are. They want to have their own homes, drive a car, manage their own money, have a job, get married, go out with friends...just like everybody else. Some of the most heart-wrenching words I have heard from clients have been from those with mental retardation who asked "Why am I like this? Why did I have to be born this way?"

Compared to the Kirkbride, this one's as impressive....as a public high school.

I lived in this building on the top right floor. The place was called centerpoint. It is now in tewksbury ma.

This is a really good shot and the sky looks like it is going to storm.....its looks so perfect with the building