Io Weiden Millcaster State
Senior Thesis | 2024
Millcaster State Io Weiden
Gloves are uncomfortable. Don’t get me wrong - I’m glad to be wearing them as I hoist myself through this ancient window probably jammed with lead paint, asbestos, and all other sorts of crap that a deteriorating state lunatic asylum from the 1800’s would be filled with - but that doesn’t make them any less uncomfortable. God, I can’t tell if that creaaaak I just heard is the floor or my freshly ruined bones from the way I stuck that landing.
I hear Juno: “Man, I’m glad we brought gloves, look at how gross the chipped paint is!”
“It can’t be worse than our history classroom.”
Y’know, maybe pulling up to Millcaster State Hospital in the dead of November wasn’t the most thought out idea, but hey, I can drive now, and there was nothing there to stop me. I gesture towards her and start walking, hopefully looking less scared than I actually am.
“Betchya won’t go down those steps”, Juno teases. I see that she’s pointing to a flight of stairs that may or may not lead to the
underworld. I’m swallowing the lump in my throat as I walk down, her following closely behind me. I’m relieved, I only see a dusty boiler room.
“Hey Juno, do you hear that hissing sound too?”
Juno shrugs, “what of it? It’s a boiler room, that’s just the sound they make.”
“You’re probably right.”
I try to move past it, but something feels off about the hissing noise. I’m back upstairs before I can think about it too hard.
Moving through the next few rooms is fine, I guess. Something strikes me as peculiar. This room doesn’t feel like a nursery, but there’s a crib here, all by itself. I hear breathing near the crib. I’m not alarmed, but … offput? Not really, even. I tell Juno what I hear and like always, she doesn’t notice anything, though she tells me she’s pretty creeped out by the crib. Something is watching us, but something is always watching, so does it even really matter? We shrug it off.
Juno stops short, I notice her gazing at a wall scarred with marks looking like those of a coffin left by people who tried to pry their way out, only to be left with bleeding fingernails and moribund lungs. Juno looks haunted. “Jesus Christ. What happened there?”
“Let’s find out”. Where should I sit? It looks like that corner has no cobwebs. Fuck, there probably are cobwebs, and now it’s too late, I’m already sitting here- holy shit, are me and Juno CUDDLING? Who cares about cobwebs? Pulling out my phone, I start playing the Buzzfeed
Unsolved video on this place. I’m sure the video is interesting, but how am I supposed to think about anything when I’m pressed up against her like this? Wait, did that just say a patient died from a lobotomy here? IN THIS BUILDING? I need to get out of here. “Hey Griff, your phone’s only at 10. Serves you right for owning an Apple, but maybe we should get outta here. It’s hella late anyway.”
I’m so glad she said that, because right now I can feel all my clothes touching me, and it’s so hard to think about what to say when all my clothes are touching me.
“Agreed, it’s getting pretty cold in here”.
Briskly winding our way through the corridors gets us to our window. Juno pulls herself up, “hey, we should come bA-” THE
FLOOR IS FUCKING CAVING IN. Oh my god, oh god, I’m running back, I, wait is Juno- “GRIFFON” I’m so glad to hear her voice. She’s peering down at me, gripping firmly onto the windowsill like I am onto - wait, what am I even holding onto? I’m so dizzy, but I need to focus on getting out of here.
“Juno stop freaking out-”
“we almost died, how am I supposed to stop?”
“Look, I still might die in this dump if you don’t bring me a ladder!! House keys are in the slidey thingy in the front middle of the car, go directly down into the basement and the ladder should be there. And don’t crash, or else I'll be stuck driving you around
for another year.” As I’m telling her all this, I’m so glad I can stay calm during these types of situations. I don’t know how long that took, but Juno is running off now, and I’m left alone in this gaping ghost of an institution.
All I have to do is wait for Juno to get back. That’s not hard. That’s what I should tell myself at least. Fingers. I feel them slowly touch the back of my neck, softly coming down one by one. I’m used to feeling presences that other people don’t, yet I seldom feel the rising sense of danger that comes with whatever presence I’m noticing right now. I want it to stop and I want to leave. I tell myself my brain is fucking with me, but I don’t think that’s true.
Juno won’t be here for a while anyway, so there’s no point in standing here. I feel a sense of relief walking away, but that’s ravished from me instantly. I hear the buzz of electricity, the sparks, the crackling. The wing I’m in comes alive with light, power that hasn’t surged through these walls in 40 years. I dart through the echoing, empty halls; I might fall through like I almost
did earlier, but I don’t fucking care. I don’t expect the wing I’m in right now to treat me any better, so I start feeling the walls for any hope of exit. I could dig my way out, and I think I will. Maybe my hands will end up like those people who were buried alive. I’m coming to the sinking feeling that being against this building is no longer a choice. My palms are plastered in place, and it feels like something took a needle and thread and sewed me onto the moldering wall. Asphyxiation, I think, a beautiful word for an excruciating fate. I scramble and grasp to rip my mask off but I can’t and I can't breathe, I’m drowning. I’m drowning in thin air.
SHIT. I hurtle off the wall as my body is bashed into the floor, but I’m free. I can’t believe my ribs aren’t cracked, genuinely. I would’ve been crying, but I don’t have the time for that right now. I don’t know why it just … stopped, but I don’t have the time to wonder about that either. I need to run.
I don’t care if the floor swallows me anymore. Falling through this place sounds infinitely better than meeting whatever
wants me dead here, probably the patient who died in that video. Classic horror movie, some unlucky soul who died from a horrible injustice is cursed to haunt the place in which they suffered until they get their vengeance. I’m darting and ducking through these unfamiliar halls as I think this, narrowly missing tripping into my doom a few times as I do so. I don’t even know where I am in the asylum anymore, but I think I should lay low in the room I just found. My hands meet tiled floors as I slide down the crusty wall. I try to piece together what this room was; it’s dark, but I can make out big hunks of metal in a lot of this room. I think this used to be a kitchen. Geez, imagine if food was leftover from when this place closed, that would be fucking disgusting. I doubt there is, but like, imagine. God, I feel something coming near here. I can’t know this, my mind could be playing tricks on me. No. Something is near here. I have to be still, completely, utterly still, as stiff as a corpse. There’s a second thing in here, I feel it on my leg. Whatever is brushing against me is real, well, not that whatever’s
outside is any less real right now, but whatever’s on my leg feels alive. I’m clenching my lungs, eyes, my entire body not to make a sound or movement, because I don’t want to die. I should NOT look at what’s making its way up my body right now. Fuck. FUCK. A spider is inching its way up me right now, I’m gonna puke, I can't even swallow right now. I’m still perfectly still somehow, except for the shaking, I don’t even know what my body is doing right now. I’m holding back vomit, tears, and every violent movement I should be doing right now. I feel the horrible, lanky legs continue up, touching my face now. Closer… my eye, touching my eye….
I’m not dead. HOW AM I NOT DEAD? I feel awful. Fucking. Awful. My head rings, and now I’m remembering everything that happened to me. I’m dusting myself off, I don't think anyone's ever stood up quicker than I did just now. I want to tear off my skin, I feel horrible, I want to pick everything the spider touched off my body. I guess whatever was outside left,
because nothing responded to the gasps for air which just left my lungs. I’m getting the fuck outta this room. I’m so disoriented, like. Extremely disoriented. It’s probably a bad idea to explore in here, but hey, what’s not a bad idea in this place? The only thing I should've done differently was just to not come here in the first place. I don’t dare pull up my flashlight for obvious reasons, so I’m trying my best to soak in everything I’m seeing using any natural light I detect. Although it's faint, I think I’m seeing traces of graffiti on these walls. Moving closer, I find that this room has quite a lot of it; smiley faces, penises, and really shitty love poetry are all inscribed. I breathe a quick sigh of relief, because I’m so glad I’m not the only one who’s been here. “JUSTICE FOR PHINEAS McCAIN” is sprawled across the wall by the window. I sneer, because I wouldn’t call trying to kill some random kid in your asylum “justice”. Newspapers and tabloids, I notice, are sprawled all across the floor. Old ones at that. Going against my better judgment, I brush off the dust and grime and begin to read:
“ASYLUM STAFF MEMBER MURDERED BY INMATES OF MILLCASTER STATE HOSPITAL.” Wait, the hell? As I’m reading more and more, I realize that I know less and less about how fucked up this place actually is, and more importantly, what exactly is trying to slaughter me. I really should’ve paid more attention to that video. WAIT! JUNO! How long was I out for? She might almost be back! I hold down the buttons on my phone, stuffing it into my jacket as white light blares from the screen. Pings from Juno say she’s not far at all around five minutes ago, and my heart is soaring. I can’t cry now, I really can’t, but boy do I need to. It’s finally time to leave this decrepit shithole.
Where am I? This place somehow is even bigger than how it looks on the outside. I don’t blame myself for getting lost in this place in the slightest - if I didn’t, I’d probably be dead right now, but I genuinely have no clue where to go from here. I head into a room which looks kinda familiar. I’m trying to figure out if I've been here before - I see a torn up, molding dental style chair with a
dead light overhead. Next to it is an unloved, rusty table retaining a horrifying menagerie of scalpels, blades, and tools. I fucking hate this room. I feel it again and my heart is dropping, shattering. I can’t move. I stand like a soldier, static, frozen stiff. My feet aren’t touching the floor anymore, and now I’m flying back into that disgusting, slimy chair. My body is being gently pushed into it, and my arms are slowly extending out. My body is preparing for a crucifixion and I can do nothing except wish I was never born. I feel the trickle of warm liquid begin down my face. Metallic drops end up in my mouth, as my eyes ooze out more and more blood. The pressing stops. I’m happy to be in the afterlife that quickly, but this isn’t the afterlife, I’m still alive? I’m blinking as fast as I can to get the blood out of my eyes, and this place lights up. Sparks rain from above as lightbulbs screech and shatter in every which way. Smoke, there is smoke in here, where’s the fucking smoke coming from - my legs buckle out like a doe’s and I need to puke, and the ROOM IS SHAKING, LIKE I’M IN A JENGA HOUSE. I
do what I should’ve fucking done fifteen seconds ago and run, run, run, run as the room collapses up in flames, which I think are now extinguished, but I am NEVER going to check that, I’m running, I see Juno, and I’m out.
The Author’s Statement
This is actually the third year in a row in which I’ve written about psychiatric hospitals and their treatment of their patients, specialized in the 1940’s-1950’s. Two years ago I wrote in a new ring of hell for Dante’s Inferno created for asylum staff who abused their patients. One year ago, I designed a proposed horrorvideo game in which you experience living in a state asylum in the 1950’s. You might be wondering why I have this level of dedication to a niche topic, and why I’ve come back to it year after year. Given my background, it’s unsurprising that I’m so interested in psychology and its history. For one, my dad is a psychiatrist, and has been explaining the depths of psychiatry to me ever since I was small. I’ve also had a range of developmental delays, some of which still affecting me today, which left me pondering about why exactly I was different from others.
Like most others in the eleven to eighteen year old demographic, the paranormal kept my interest. I loved to learn about haunted locations, grim histories, and ghost hunting methodology throughout my years. One program on the subject that is very near and dear to me is Buzzfeed Unsolved:
Supernatural. I spent hours on Youtube watching Shane and Ryan, the hosts, debrief the history of reportedly haunted locations and then visiting said locations themselves. They went through hotels, houses, prisons, and, of note, frequented asylums and state hospitals - I took a particular liking to those episodes. I cherish Buzzfeed Unsolved so much that I even incorporate it into my story.
Around two years ago (the middle of Autumn of 2021), I happened to discover the ruins of the Metropolitan State Hospital in Waltham, Massachusetts. Though most of the property has been redeveloped into housing, the old administration building still
stands today. To say the least, I was fascinated by the structure. For one, it was a physical manifestation of topics I had interest inan old psychiatric facility with alleged hauntings and a dark past. But there was something else. I was enamored with how the sun shone on the deteriorated bricks, with all the stories and people contained within the barely-contained walls, with how sad that dying building was, with the myriad nameless feelings just gazing upon it stirred within me. From the Metropolitan State Hospital administration building came the genesis of a brand new interest: abandoned structures.
Immediately after that experience, I poured my soul into researching abandoned properties, usually through YouTube. One channel, The Proper People, especially caught my attention, and I found myself blazing through all of Bryan and Michael (the channel owners)’s content. Upon watching their exploration of a particularly infamous institution, I realized that it was actually
down the road from the Metropolitan State Hospital; I, of course, set off to find it. The campus of the old Walter E. Fernald Developmental Center is huge, and most of the buildings remain standing today. The place offered so much to see, and so much history to absorb. When I personally walked the grounds, the institution felt haunted - both physically and metaphorically - to me. The discomfort I experienced only fueled my passion, which evolved into rage when I researched the institution. The more I learned, the worse it got.
Coincidentally, a project for my history class was assigned around this time. In that we had just read Dante’s Inferno, one of the options for the assignment was to create a new ring of hell; it was like the stars aligned. Inspired by all the horrible things that the Walter E. Fernald Developmental Center inflicted upon its patients, I got to work on giving the abusive staff of asylums what they deserved. My research broadened to hospitals across the
country, and I soon chose to focus on what went on in these institutions throughout the 1940’s-1950’s. Along with general research, I learned all about the horrible treatments forced upon unconsenting patients during this era: lobotomies, electroshock therapy, and hydrotherapy to name a few. The Inferno assignment solidified my interest and knowledge of the area, and I consider the project the groundwork for my senior thesis.
One of the most challenging aspects of writing this story was getting the tense right. I wrote the story using first-person present tense, which was difficult to write and also my first time ever doing. In my opinion, putting the narrative in first person creates a scarier perspective since the reader is the character while they read. Present tense made a lot of sense for the story as well.
Think about it: writing “the ghost chased me” conveys that the event already happened, which implies that the character is okay. Writing “the ghost is chasing me”, on the other hand, creates a
sense of urgency where anything can happen. Although admittedly this tense was a pain to write in, I believe this was the right choice for my horror story.
The story takes place in the abandoned main building of the fictional Millcaster State Hospital. I intended Millcaster State to be a Kirkbride Plan hospital from the start, and modeled the building design after the Weston State Hospital in West Virginia. The hospital is located in the United States: though the location of the institution is not revealed, I imagine it to be east of the Mississippi river. The interior of the building is inspired by a multitude of sources. Though the floor plan is still intended to be close to Weston State’s, the interior rooms draws from Pennhurst, Kings Park Psychiatric Center, and many more abandoned asylums that I happened to see footage of. The biggest inspiration for the inside is undoubtedly the Walter E. Fernald Developmental Center, which I
have had the privilege of physically visiting. The scene with the crib was actually based on my own experiences.
There are two ghosts in the story: Phineas McCain and the asylum staff member. Their backstories are only alluded to in my story, so I’ll give a rundown here. The Millcaster State Hospital staff, like most other institutions during this time period, administered horrible treatments on patients, and, like most other institutions during this time period, got away with what they did scot-free. One out of the numerous atrocities within the walls of Millcaster State was Phineas McCain’s death. McCain, a bright young man with a promising future, was forcibly lobotomized, and when he started bleeding out during the procedure, a certain staff member did nothing to stop it from happening. Phineas was beloved by other asylum patients, and when word got out about the details of his massacre, they were furious. Soon after, the staff
member was killed by the patients, and both ghosts have been trapped inside the institution ever since.
Readers of my story take on the perspective of a high school sophomore by the name of Griff (short for Griffon). I tried my best to highlight some of Griff’s traits despite my story’s fast pacing. Their ability to be level headed after near death experiences is necessary for the plot to progress, and definitely shows throughout the story. Griffon has sensory processing disorder; their most extreme symptom, hypersensitivity to touch, is displayed throughout the story. Griff’s deficits assist the story for two main reasons. For one, the asylum staff member’s ghost has more of a motive to try to seek out and “fix” Griffon as there is something “wrong” with them. Secondly, Griff has an excellent extrasensory perception-like ability, which is, at least in part, attributable to their SPD. Griffon also suffers from arachnophobia, which is something I share with them. In my own experience, my
fear isn’t really taken seriously, and has more of an impact on my daily life than one might think. I wanted to create a character that represents how terrorizing phobias can be. The prospect of spiders might’ve prevented Griff from even entering Millcaster State if it weren’t for Juno, whom they wanted to impress.
Juno is Griff’s closest friend and crush. She’s definitely one of the weaker points of my story; I wanted to flesh her out to be more than a love interest, but there wasn’t much room for her character to develop in the story. She’s brave yet creeped out easily, and is almost ready to take her driver’s test. Juno is also more interested in ghosts and the paranormal than Griffon is, but usually passes off the presences Griffon senses as something else.
For the majority of the story, Griff is led to believe that they are being haunted by the spirit of Phineas McCain, reasoning that he is vengeful because of his murder in the hospital. However,
when they come across some papers and graffiti left behind by previous explorers of the asylum, they discover that a second person, a staff member, died in the institution. Griff doesn’t really have the time to find out who exactly is haunting them, but I heavily imply that McCain isn’t to blame. What Griffon doesn’t know is that McCain has actually been trying to protect them.
Disclaimer: some parts in the overview of ghostly activity in the story will be unfamiliar. Since the reader actively experiences the narrative through Griffon’s perspective, there are a few details that Griffon couldn’t pick up on. Unbeknownst to Griffon, the thing they feel is watching them around the crib room is actually McCain making benign contact. The fingers that Griff feels on the back of their neck belong to the asylum staff member, who is assessing Griff’s brain and physicality. Whenever the electricity goes off in the asylum is when the two ghosts make contact; the more powerful the surge is, the more intense the contact is. The asylum staff’s first true attempt to overpower Griff is when they
were suffocated against the wall, but Phineas aided in their release. The presence Griff sensed outside while hiding was McCain’s spirit. At the climax of the story, Griff unluckily walks into an old operating room, which the asylum staff member quickly locates them in. They attempt to lobotomize Griff, but are unsuccessful in doing so when Phineas quickly comes to Griffon’s aid. The interghost encounter is so strong that it leads to the old operating room collapsing. It’s unknown what happens to either ghost after that.
Thank you for reading my thesis project!!! owo