Pennhurst Asylum, Spring City: History, Ghosts and Investigations

Pennhurst sits on Crab Hill above the Schuylkill River near Spring City, about 45 minutes northwest of Philadelphia. It opened in 1908 as a state institution for people with intellectual and physical disabilities, and more than 10,500 people lived there before it closed in December 1987. Overcrowding, neglect and abuse were exposed on television in 1968, and the federal lawsuit that followed helped end the era of large, isolated institutions across the United States.

The lower campus is now privately owned and has become known as Pennhurst Asylum. It hosts a seasonal haunted attraction, daytime history tours and overnight paranormal investigations, and it has appeared on Ghost Adventures, Ghost Hunters and A&E’s World’s Biggest Ghost Hunt. This guide covers the documented history, the stories investigators tell, and how to visit with the respect the place deserves.

History of Pennhurst State School and Hospital

The Pennsylvania Legislature authorized a new institution for southeastern Pennsylvania in 1903, after a state commission counted thousands of people with intellectual disabilities living in mental hospitals, almshouses and prisons. The campus was built between 1903 and 1908 as a group of red brick buildings with terra cotta and granite trim, laid out as separate cottages and linked by underground tunnels. The first resident was admitted on November 23, 1908. Its original name, the Eastern Pennsylvania State Institution for the Feeble-Minded and Epileptic, reflects the attitudes of the time.

Those attitudes shaped everything that followed. In 1913 a state commission described disabled people as unfit for citizenship and recommended custodial care, and in 1916 the trustees planned separate women’s cottages partly to prevent pregnancies. Pennhurst kept growing, and by 1950 it had 3,350 beds. Time magazine later summed up its record as understaffed, dirty and violent.

In 1968 WCAU-TV reporter Bill Baldini anchored a five-part report, Suffer the Little Children, that showed the public the conditions inside. On May 30, 1974, Philadelphia attorney David Ferleger filed a class action on behalf of residents, later joined by the US government and the Pennsylvania Association for Retarded Citizens. The suit described residents being beaten, strapped to beds and neglected. In 1977 US District Judge Raymond Broderick ruled that conditions violated residents’ constitutional rights, and his March 1978 order covered the 1,156 people then living there. In 1983 nine employees were indicted on charges that included beating residents.

Halderman v. Pennhurst went as far as the US Supreme Court and gave its name to a legal principle still taught today. The case ended in a settlement that required community services for every resident, and over nine years Pennhurst’s residents moved into small group homes, most shared by three people or fewer. The institution closed on December 9, 1987, and similar lawsuits went on to close large institutions in other states.

The upper campus became the Southeastern Veterans’ Center. The lower campus was sold to a private developer in 2008, and in 2010 owner Richard Chakejian and haunt operator Randy Bates opened a Halloween attraction in the old buildings. The Pennhurst Memorial and Preservation Alliance, formed to protect the site’s history, called it a travesty and urged a boycott, and disability advocates objected that it demeaned the people who had lived there. Management changed in the late 2010s, a museum moved into Mayflower Hall, and the current haunt casts many disabled performers. Several decaying buildings, including Hershey, Rockwell and Dietary halls, were demolished in 2020 after being found unsafe.

The ghost stories of Pennhurst

Former residents, as investigators describe them

Most Pennhurst ghost stories are not about one named spirit. Investigators and guides talk instead about the presence of former residents, many of whom spent most of their lives here, and of the staff who worked the wards. Visitors report voices, whispers, footsteps and the sense of being watched in empty rooms.

Please keep in mind that these were real people, many still remembered by family members, former staff and the disability community. Disability historian Sarah Handley-Cousins, quoted in a public history study of the site, put it simply: the people who lived at Pennhurst were human beings with complex lives, not spooky spirits.

Mayflower Hall

Mayflower Hall, a former residential building, is the heart of the paranormal side of Pennhurst today. Its four floors are open on overnight investigations, and it also houses the site’s museum of artifacts. Guests on investigations report knocks, footsteps on empty floors and responses on spirit boxes, though none of it has been shown to be anything more than a story.

When the Ghost Hunters team investigated for Syfy, Mayflower was one of their main locations, and over the night they reported voices, footsteps, slamming doors and shadows.

The tunnels

Pennhurst’s buildings were connected by underground tunnels so staff and supplies could move between them in any weather. Several sections, named for the buildings above them such as Philadelphia and Devon, are now part of the investigation route.

Ghost Hunters reported whispers in the tunnels that seemed to grow clearer and a voice that appeared to say “Spring City”. The same episode is a good reminder to stay skeptical: one groan the team caught on tape turned out to be a cow on a nearby dairy farm.

The Quaker and Devon buildings

The Ghost Hunters episode also covered the Quaker building and its basement, where the team reported a loud bang they could not reproduce, and the Devon building. In the episode, the team described reports of people being pushed and of a crowbar being thrown, all told as claims rather than events anyone documented.

The Quaker building is now part of the self-guided Paranormal Experience, so visitors can judge it for themselves.

On television

Ghost Adventures opened its third season at Pennhurst, and the crew reported EVPs that seemed to say “go away” and “help me”, banging outside the building and an overturned desk. Travel Channel’s Destination Fear filmed here in 2019, and in the same year A&E aired World’s Biggest Ghost Hunt: Pennhurst Asylum, billed as a two-week continuous investigation of the grounds.

Television has made Pennhurst famous, but it has also blurred fact and fiction. The asylum in Stranger Things borrows the name, and the early haunted attraction invented a mad doctor. None of that is the real Pennhurst.

Where to look

• Mayflower Hall: all four floors are open on overnight investigations, and the building houses the museum.
• The underground tunnels: dark, narrow and atmospheric; sound carries in strange ways, so record carefully.
• The Quaker building: featured on Ghost Hunters and now on the self-guided Paranormal Experience route.
• The Devon building: another Ghost Hunters location, linked to the tunnel network.
• The administration building: the grand building at the front of the campus, now home to the main haunted attraction in the fall. Best seen from outside on a history tour.

Visiting and investigating Pennhurst

Pennhurst is private property and is only open for ticketed events. Never visit after hours or wander onto the neighboring Southeastern Veterans’ Center, which is a working care facility. Everything is booked through the official Pennhurst Asylum website.

Daytime history tours are the best first visit. Professional guides lead a walk of about three hours past the exteriors of 16 lower campus buildings, into some remediated spaces and through preserved artifacts, with talks from former Pennhurst employees. The site warns that some of the history may be upsetting and asks guests to come with an open and respectful mind. A separate photography tour lets you take pictures around the campus and inside some buildings.

Overnight paranormal investigations run from 7 PM to 2 AM in Mayflower Hall and the tunnels, in small groups with a guide. They are for adults 18 and over; check the site for its rules on younger guests with a guardian. Groups can also rent the site privately, from $1,250 for up to 10 people on Sunday to Thursday nights. Alcohol and drugs are banned, and the buildings have no heat or running water.

The haunted attraction runs on Friday and Saturday nights from late September to early November, plus Sundays in October. It is a high-startle, full-contact haunt with four parts: the Asylum in the administration building, the Morgue, the Tunnels and the Catacombs. For 2026 the site added a self-guided Paranormal Experience through Mayflower, Quaker, Tinicum and the tunnels. Ticket prices change through the season, so check the official site.

Haunted Rooms does not run ghost hunts at Pennhurst. If you would like to investigate with our team, our nearest event is at Fort Mifflin in Philadelphia, about 30 miles away.

• Visiting Private campus, open only for ticketed events
• Tours Seasonal haunted attraction (late September to early November), daytime history tours and paranormal investigations
• Hours and season Haunted attraction Fridays and Saturdays from late September, plus October Sundays
• Tickets Haunted attraction combos from about $55; the 2026 self-guided Paranormal Experience is $45
• Ghost hunting Yes: public and Mayflower Hall investigations, including late-night sessions (18+)

Tips for your visit

• Take the daytime history tour before an investigation. Hearing the residents’ story first changes how you experience the buildings at night.
• Dress for the weather outside and wear sturdy, closed-toe shoes. The buildings are unheated and the campus is uneven.
• Bring spare batteries and snacks; guests on investigations can return to their cars during the night.
• If you want quiet recordings, avoid haunt nights in the fall, when the attraction is loud and busy.
• Be respectful in what you post. Avoid mocking language about the people who lived here, and do not take anything from the site.

More haunted places nearby

• Eastern State Penitentiary: Philadelphia’s famous prison, another site where history and haunting meet
• Haunted places in Philadelphia: Fort Mifflin, Independence Hall and more, about 45 minutes southeast
• Haunted hotels in Pennsylvania: for a haunted place to stay nearby
• Haunted places in Pennsylvania

Sources

Facts on this page are checked against the official website, historic records and news coverage. Ghost stories are reported as staff, visitors and investigators tell them, and we say where records contradict a story.

• Pennhurst Asylum (official site)
• Pennhurst Asylum: Daytime history and photography tours
• Pennhurst Asylum: Paranormal investigations
• Wikipedia: Pennhurst State School and Hospital
• NBC Philadelphia (AP): Haunted house at Pennhurst causes outrage (2010)
• NCPH History@Work: Who should tell the story? The Pennhurst haunted asylum and museum
• Philadelphia Inquirer: Pennhurst Asylum critics and its disabled cast (2022)
• Syfy: Ghost Hunters episode recap, Pennsylvania asylum