The Marlboro Psychiatriac Hospital: One Last Look

The Marlboro State Psychiatric Hospital has been .

The hospital property has gone from being a farm, to a state psychiatric hospital, to a state financial burden, to an environmental and Weird NJ super site.

In 2011, , which has become an environmental hazard, and turn it over to Marlboro for recreational and open space use. The timeline of the project has not yet been released, however Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno said she hopes the project will be completed by 2014.

After more than six decades of the hospital running under state funding, it was shut down after a state investigation, prompted by an undercover operation. On July 1, 1998, the state hospital closed its doors for good.

Closing the state hospital came after State Senator Richard Codey went undercover in the hospital, hired as an orderly. Codey chronicled his experience in New Jersey Monthly magazine, saying he witnessed “inhumane care and treatment of mental patients,” as well as poor living and working conditions.

The property is over 400 acres with 600,000 square feet of buildings. Since its closing, the hospital property has been used for military exercises. However, due to ghost stories about the hospital and its persona as a mental institution, it has become a popular Weird NJ location.

Local legend says the hospital was originally built on a cattle farm, where the slaughterhouse stands. Stories told say the original owner of the land wound up as a patient of the hospital. In the ghost hunting world, some tell stories of hearing squealing pigs and cows at night as well as footsteps and voices.

Regardless of the reality of paranormal activity on the premises, the hospital will likely remain a popular site for the daring and the curious, until the buildings are knocked down, and the land cleaned up and re-developed for other use.

Video shot and edited by NJ Discover.