This is an overhead view of the former Northampton State Hospital. If you click on the link below it will take you to the Advocates' (a weekly newspaper in western MA) website, which has an interactive tour of the old main building (the building outlined in red). The main building is a Kirkbride structure. Kirkbride designed many state hospitals throughout New England and the Midwest. He believed the way the buildings were set up would provide the best opportunity for people to heal.

The building looks like a bat or bird from above. The two "wings" of the building were seperated by male and female. The place where they meet is the entrace and area of the building and housed nurses stations and clericle offices. The "wings which housed the patients were set up with the most severe patients at the tips of the wings with each section that comes closer to the center houseing patients who where higher functioning.

For the virtual tour visit http://www.valleyadvocate.com/mis/somvrtour/index.cfm

More on Northampton State Hospital:
http://people.umass.edu/asaph/nsh/
http://www.smith.edu/nsh/history.html

More on Dr. Thomas Story Kirkbride http://www.kirkbridebuildings.com/

info about Massachusetts State Hospitals visit http://www.1856.org/