The hospital across the street from the cache used to be called West Tennessee Hospital for the Insane, but is now called Western State Mental Health Institute. In the 1970s and 1980s, this place was a common childhood threat..."if you don't behave you'll go to Western State"!!
If you want to learn more about the complex, then read below and look at the pics. If not, then go find the cache!! There is parking nearby, and always be mindful of passing traffic (it can be busy at times).
Congrats to jackthebear for FTF!!
West Tennessee Hospital for the Insane (now Western State Mental Health Institute) in Bolivar opened with the transfer of 156 patients from Nashville in 1889. The west wing was the female ward, the east wing the male ward, dining wing to the rear, and admin offices in the center. The building was NR (National Registry)-Listed in 1987 prior to the removal of the condemned wings in the late 1980s.
Western State Mental Hospital was the last state mental hospital to be constructed and habitually the one least funded. The institution's patient population grew from a few hundred in the 1890s to over 2,000 in the 1960s as patients remained hospitalized for decades. Many were crowded into large dormitories and had little privacy. With a limited number of doctors and attendants and a large patient population, many were simply "warehoused."
Patients at Western received the treatments available in their period of institutionalization. These treatments ranged from hydrotherapy and insulin shock therapy to lobotomies and electric shock therapy. With the severe staff limitations, however, patients were fortunate to receive ten minutes per week with a psychiatrist.
In modern times, "deinstitutionalization" produced a marked decrease in the patient population as mental health experts called for treatment of the mentally ill in local mental health clinics. Although there have been indications that this treatment has not been successful, it continues to the present time, and the indigent mentally ill continue to pose a major problem for society.
It’s said that the building is haunted by patients who died on the grounds (there are two cemeteries), more notably those who allegedly got lost in the underground tunnels. Remember, it is illegal to trespass!!