Maysville Kentucky

Maysville Hospital

Dedicated health professionals are causing paranormal activity.

DESCRIPTION AND HISTORY

Maysville Hospital is a four story, rectangular brick building, funky yet still handsome, and built to last. From the sidewalk on Market Street, behind an imposing fence, there is a steep set of steps which lead up to the land plateau on which the hospital was constructed. There are three Greek columns on the front of the building, between the second and third floor. The triangular marble pieces which were originally placed on the top of the columns is missing. Ivy has covered the right side of the front. While some windows are broken or missing, many others, especially on the second through fourth floors seem to be in good shape. We were glad that the building didn’t suffer the fate of the Kalamazoo Sanitorium.

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Though there is a huge mess on the inside, which would cost a million dollars to clean up, this building really doesn’t look too destroyed on the outside, even though it has been somewhat abandoned and neglected since 1983. For years, the powers that be tried to decide whether to renovate the still sturdy brick structure into a combination of retail stores, and apartments, like the Maysfield High School building, or just tear it down, which also would be terribly expensive. Hopefully the preservation groups will succeed in turning this brick building into something useful once again, like apartments!

This plot of land has long been the place of some kind of hospital. In the 1800s, the Wilson family and friends built a small medical facility, known as The Wilson Infirmary, run by May Pearl Wilson. When she died in 1908, the little hospital was closed and torn down, to make room for a new hospital, constructed in 1915, temporarily called Hayswood Seminary. The name was changed in 1923, to Hayswood Hospital, to reflect a full service facility, which had two additions added to the main structure in 1925 and 1971, during its long time in service. In its prime, there were 87 beds available, which was ample enough room for the needs of a small community.

However, what was considered an ideal location for a hospital in 1915, didn’t meet the needs of the 1980s. Besides being too small to handle a growing community, with no more room to expand, this hospital’s location is in a place hard to get to in an emergency. The streets around it are too narrow, with no room to add more lanes to handle the traffic. A new hospital, Meadowview Regional Medical Center, was constructed on the outskirts of town, and Hayswood Hospital closed in 1983.

After eleven years sitting vacant, this property was sold at public auction to Ester Johnson, connected to Classic Properties, a company specifically formed to take care of the building and transform it into a new use, reviving its purpose for the present and future. Classic Properties, in the 1990s, did a beautiful job transforming Maysville High School buildings into apartments. However, financial woes plagued the renovation plans for Hayswood Hospital. In 2000, Classic Properties offered to sell it to the city of Maysville, for $55,000, but the city thought better of it because of the million dollar price tag needed to clean the building up.

However, tearing down a huge brick building would also be terribly expensive, which left the fate of this building in limbo, and a tempting target for copper thieves, who stole the copper piping out of the place in 2006.

As of 2007-08, the cogs of progress are slowly moving toward either to transform this huge structure into a combination of apartments/business development, or to tear it down. An environmental impact study has been done, with samples taken from all over the building. Hopefully, this grand building will be granted a new purpose for this community.

HISTORY OF MANIFESTATIONS

Hospitals are inevitably places of life and death, and healing and suffering, which opens the possibilities of lost spirits wandering around. People who died there, as well as the dedicated health professionals who can’t let go of their calling, are some of the known entities who call the Maysville Hospital their home or place of work, even in the afterlife.

MANIFESTATIONS

General Activity

The living have reported the feeling of being watched, both inside and outside the building.

Neighbors have reported seeing glowing lights in the windows, and an apparition who likes to stand by the last third floor window. Shadow people, presumed to be ex-patients, have also been seen by the living.

Auditory Manifestations

Crying babies, disembodied voices, and the moans of the suffering who are long dead, but unable to go the other side.

The Entity of a Woman

Because of a disastrous labor, both a mother and baby died, resulting in the following haunting:

The entity of a woman, carrying her newborn baby, has been seen walking through the maternity ward, perhaps looking for her family, or trying to go home.

She has been seen standing in the maternity ward, crying hard, holding her dead baby. She may not know that she is in the afterlife, or perhaps she can’t accept her own death and her child’s demise in the childbirth process.

The Entities of Dedicated Staff

Are still on the job and don’t want to leave their work, trying to save and help the sick.

Shadows of doctors and nurses have been seen throughout the building. Even before the hospital closed, one eyewitness awoke from his surgery, and noticed two nurses watching him, who faded away before his eyes.

STILL HAUNTED?

Yes indeed.

Besides eyewitness accounts from the neighbors and former patients, a few paranormal groups have investigated this building, as well as others who have taken tours by themselves, sometimes getting arrested (not recommended!).

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LOCATION

The Maysville Hospital building can be found in Maysville, Kentucky, on Market Street, near the intersection of Market Street and 4th. Market Street runs along the hill just above the town of Maysville, a strategic spot to see a glorious view of the Ohio River, the downtown section of Maysville, and the Simon Kenton Bridge, which connects Kentucky to the Cincinnati area of Ohio.