HALLOWEEN SPECIAL Episode 114: Pennhurst State School and Hospital

Happy Halloween everyone! The original horror story you’re about to hear is based off of a nightmare I had while researching this Halloween season’s batch of episodes. It’s a nightmare that followed me around for days, before I finally put it down on the page. It’s called “The Haunting of Pemberley Sanitorium.”Disclaimer: This episode mentions suicide/self-harm.

Louisville, Kentucky is home to many great things. Bourbon, the Kentucky Derby, the largest manufacturing plant of disco balls - you can find it all in Louisville. But this amazing city is also home to what many consider one of the most haunted locations in the world, Waverly Hills Sanitorium and Hospital. *Disclaimer: This episode mentions instances of self-harm and suicide. Listener discretion is advised.

In 1968, NBC reporter Bill Baldini walked through the halls of an asylum meant for the “feeble-minded and epileptic" and saw first hand the deplorable conditions that these patients were living in. He would later say that what he witnessed that day stayed with him the remainder of his career. Because the Pennhurst State School and Hospital, popularly known as the Pennhurst Asylum, haunts people, and it continues to do so to this day.

The Trans-Allegheny Insane Asylum in West Virginia is made primarily from blue sandstone, which is often associated with inner calm and overcoming emotional hurtles. But unfortunately, rather than becoming a place known for its positive patient outcomes, the Trans-Allegheny Insane Asylum became the home of the West Virginia Lobotomy Project.

High on a hill in Essex County, Cedar Grove, New Jersey, sit the ruins Overbrook Asylum. Patients were promised care, but what they got instead were unsafe living conditions and trauma that survived even when the asylum itself did not. The ghosts of Overbrook have a story to tell, and it seems as though reducing the building to rubble has not silenced them.

Every spooky season, Scary Stories for the Soul does one episode a week for the month of October, and this month we are focusing our attention on haunted asylums and sanitoriums. To kick off our Halloween season together, we are going to travel to Rolling Hills Asylum in East Bethany, New York. With over 1,700 documented deaths, Rolling Hills Asylum is considered one of the most haunted places in America.

El Silbón is a monster from Latin American folklore who roams the forests of Los LLanos. His whistle is a death omen to any who would hear it. But who was he before he was a dreaded monster? And did he deserve his fate?

One of the most mysterious figures in Hispanic and Latin American folklore is El Charro Negro; a handsome, demonic charro who roams the streets on a black horse, acting as an omen against the power-hungry and greedy. El Charro Negro is associated with the dark side of luxury and excess, and his backstory is a sad, cautionary tale.

La Planchada was a nurse who cared about her work, her patients, and her reputation. Compassion and care were her creed, and it looks as though now, even after her death, she is still nursing the sick back to health. Learn about Mexico's most famous ghost nurse!

Sirens, Selkies, and Mermaids are all mythological creatures that rule the oceans and seas. But where do they come from, and what do they want? Are they all friendly and curious? Or do they have a more sinister agenda when luring us into the water?