Welcome to the Abandoned Japan blog. My name is Kurt Bell and I am delighted that you have taken some time to share a little of Japan with me. I’m available on Facebook and Google+ if you have questions or just want to chat and say hi. I can also be found at the JVLOG forum with other Japan-related content creators. All links are listed below. I look forward to meeting you on-line. Have a great day!

Follow me on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/softypapa

Be my friend on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/LylesBrother

On Google+
https://plus.google.com/u/0/108027407488568902619/posts

At the JVLOG forum (my username there is “softypapa”):
http://jvlog.org

You can also reach me via email at the following address: softypapa@gmail.com

—-

The Path of Wildness is easy to find
The course of a stream
Leaves blown in the wind
A beast’s track through the brush
And the direction of our first inclination

The Path of Wildness is an answer and response to a prescribed way of life which may leave some individuals with a sense that their living is little more than a series of pre-determined, step-like episodes between birth and death. The stages of living between these events: childhood, adolescence, adulthood, parenthood and senior are themselves natural and in accord with the needs of the species and most individuals. Many find their satisfaction in living this course and to these individuals I have little or nothing to say. Others though long for something more; something innate, genetic and seemingly calling. Adventure and change can give a degree of satisfaction and relief yet even these may seem too tame. To those who feel drawn to something beyond the entertainment and stimulation of senses I offer a walk along The Path of Wildness. Don’t bother penciling the event in your schedule, preparing a pack with goodies and supplies or even inviting a friend along, for this experience is along the course of your first inclination and you must surely always go alone.

The Path of Wildness Resources

• Homepage
• Facebook page
• Twitter feed

This is an abandoned hospital near Milano. This has been shot with my iPhone 4s .

The app used to shot the image was Pro HDR, cropping and adjustments were done using Snapseed, further editing was done using  VintageScene.

This is an abandoned hospital near Milano. This has been shot with my iPhone 4s .

The app used to shot the image was Pro HDR, cropping and adjustments were done using Snapseed, further editing was done using  Glaze, iColorama, VintageScene.

And shower heads that would force the average man to get on his knees to be under the water.

The front door.

Light through a window.

A tale of two wallpapers

But, how did they get WARM water??

Untill… sigh

Lovely hot water tap.

You mean you DON’T have a food processor in your backyard?

Welcome to the Abandoned Japan blog. My name is Kurt Bell and I am delighted that you have taken some time to share a little of Japan with me. I’m available on Facebook and Google+ if you have questions or just want to chat and say hi. I can also be found at the JVLOG forum with other Japan-related content creators. All links are listed below. I look forward to meeting you on-line. Have a great day!

Follow me on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/softypapa

Be my friend on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/LylesBrother

On Google+
https://plus.google.com/u/0/108027407488568902619/posts

At the JVLOG forum (my username there is “softypapa”):
http://jvlog.org

You can also reach me via email at the following address: softypapa@gmail.com

—-

The Path of Wildness is easy to find
The course of a stream
Leaves blown in the wind
A beast’s track through the brush
And the direction of our first inclination

The Path of Wildness is an answer and response to a prescribed way of life which may leave some individuals with a sense that their living is little more than a series of pre-determined, step-like episodes between birth and death. The stages of living between these events: childhood, adolescence, adulthood, parenthood and senior are themselves natural and in accord with the needs of the species and most individuals. Many find their satisfaction in living this course and to these individuals I have little or nothing to say. Others though long for something more; something innate, genetic and seemingly calling. Adventure and change can give a degree of satisfaction and relief yet even these may seem too tame. To those who feel drawn to something beyond the entertainment and stimulation of senses I offer a walk along The Path of Wildness. Don’t bother penciling the event in your schedule, preparing a pack with goodies and supplies or even inviting a friend along, for this experience is along the course of your first inclination and you must surely always go alone.

The Path of Wildness Resources

• Homepage
• Facebook page
• Twitter feed

Follow me on instagram @jennamule and twitter @jm__photography

Cedarmere, Roslyn Harbor, 2013

Follow me on instagram @jennamule and twitter @jm__photography

Cedarmere, Roslyn Harbor, 2013

Good morning everyone. I hope your week is turning out to be a great one. Mine is exceptionally busy but in such a good way. First, I’d like to say Hello and Welcome to the new followers of A Writer’s Life. Thank you for joining me along my journey which, this week, happens to be in the literal sense. As I said in yesterday’s post, I will be organizing my thoughts and ideas on how to pass along what I have learned through the years concerning my writing and although I am very excited to get this started for now I will compile everything in my notebook because after today, there won’t be much time for posts.

For those of you who follow my coinciding blog: Wolfe you know well of my inspiration for writing but for the new members among us, let me tell you a little bit about myself. I love exploring. Anything really, as long as it is something that I have never seen before, it has my full attention. New places, new things, it’s always an adventure to me. And it’s this love of discovery that takes me into the abandoned parts of the world. Factories, resorts, churches and schools are among the many places I find myself in, and once I get home it all comes together through combining both my writing and photography to create stories of my adventures which I love to share with others. It’s time for me to head out into the world once again as I meet up with friends on the East Coast for another round of exploring as we bundle up and venture out into the freezing cold.

I will pop in to say hello and share a bit about what I’m up to while I’m gone and I would love to hear from you. Those who are interested in learning more about writing I have so much information to offer up, but I will only best be able to assist you if you tell me a little about what you would like to see covered. Is it how to even get started with finding time wrting? Where to get your ideas? Questions about character development or how to organize your projects? The more I know about what you’re looking for the better I will be able to help so I encourage you to get involved and leave a comment below. Your input will fuel my thinking and fill the pages of my notebook while I am away.

After all, no matter how much you want a break, a writer’s brain never stops working and the ideas keep coming. Have a great week and I’ll be back soon

~ O

Welcome to the Abandoned Japan blog. My name is Kurt Bell and I am delighted that you have taken some time to share a little of Japan with me. I’m available on Facebook and Google+ if you have questions or just want to chat and say hi. I can also be found at the JVLOG forum with other Japan-related content creators. All links are listed below. I look forward to meeting you on-line. Have a great day!

Follow me on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/softypapa

Be my friend on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/LylesBrother

On Google+
https://plus.google.com/u/0/108027407488568902619/posts

At the JVLOG forum (my username there is “softypapa”):
http://jvlog.org

You can also reach me via email at the following address: softypapa@gmail.com

—-

The Path of Wildness is easy to find
The course of a stream
Leaves blown in the wind
A beast’s track through the brush
And the direction of our first inclination

The Path of Wildness is an answer and response to a prescribed way of life which may leave some individuals with a sense that their living is little more than a series of pre-determined, step-like episodes between birth and death. The stages of living between these events: childhood, adolescence, adulthood, parenthood and senior are themselves natural and in accord with the needs of the species and most individuals. Many find their satisfaction in living this course and to these individuals I have little or nothing to say. Others though long for something more; something innate, genetic and seemingly calling. Adventure and change can give a degree of satisfaction and relief yet even these may seem too tame. To those who feel drawn to something beyond the entertainment and stimulation of senses I offer a walk along The Path of Wildness. Don’t bother penciling the event in your schedule, preparing a pack with goodies and supplies or even inviting a friend along, for this experience is along the course of your first inclination and you must surely always go alone.

The Path of Wildness Resources

• Homepage
• Facebook page
• Twitter feed

This week I will start doing “Throwback Thursday’s” again. I’ve been so busy with everyday things.

Remember Easter is right around the corner. Contact me if you are interested in doing some portraits! JennaMule@gmail.com

Follow me on instagram @jennamule and twitter @jm__photography

Cedarmere, Roslyn Harbor, 2013

Welcome to the Abandoned Japan blog. My name is Kurt Bell and I am delighted that you have taken some time to share a little of Japan with me. I’m available on Facebook and Google+ if you have questions or just want to chat and say hi. I can also be found at the JVLOG forum with other Japan-related content creators. All links are listed below. I look forward to meeting you on-line. Have a great day!

Follow me on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/softypapa

Be my friend on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/LylesBrother

On Google+
https://plus.google.com/u/0/108027407488568902619/posts

At the JVLOG forum (my username there is “softypapa”):
http://jvlog.org

You can also reach me via email at the following address: softypapa@gmail.com

—-

The Path of Wildness is easy to find
The course of a stream
Leaves blown in the wind
A beast’s track through the brush
And the direction of our first inclination

The Path of Wildness is an answer and response to a prescribed way of life which may leave some individuals with a sense that their living is little more than a series of pre-determined, step-like episodes between birth and death. The stages of living between these events: childhood, adolescence, adulthood, parenthood and senior are themselves natural and in accord with the needs of the species and most individuals. Many find their satisfaction in living this course and to these individuals I have little or nothing to say. Others though long for something more; something innate, genetic and seemingly calling. Adventure and change can give a degree of satisfaction and relief yet even these may seem too tame. To those who feel drawn to something beyond the entertainment and stimulation of senses I offer a walk along The Path of Wildness. Don’t bother penciling the event in your schedule, preparing a pack with goodies and supplies or even inviting a friend along, for this experience is along the course of your first inclination and you must surely always go alone.

The Path of Wildness Resources

• Homepage
• Facebook page
• Twitter feed

View of the balcony auditorium after multiplexing.

The Fabian Theatre opened on December 14, 1925 in Paterson, New Jersey. Designed by Paterson architect Fred Wesley Wentworth for theater magnate Jacob Fabian, the 3,228 seat theater was built in a Sullivanesque style with a two ton chandelier, tile floors, murals, and Turkish baths in the basement.

The foyer of the Fabian Theatre.

The Fabian opened with the silent film “We Moderns” as well as a performance from the Fabian Grand Orchestra. Several of the comedy duo Abbott and Costello’s film premiers were held at the Fabian, due to it being in Lou Costello’s hometown. The films shown were “One Night in the Tropics,” “Abbott and Costello in the Foreign Legion” and “Jack and the Beanstalk.” In 1948, Reverend Charles Tarter, a civil rights pioneer, challenged segregation by repeatedly sitting in the main level of the auditorium at a time when African Americans were only allowed to sit in the balcony.

View of the back of the balcony auditorium from the stage.

Shortly after opening, the Fabian Theatre Chain merged with Stanley Warner, who modernized the theater in 1962. The standing area at the back of the main level of the auditorium was cut off from the seats by a glass wall. The seating was reduced by 500, the chandelier was replaced and a new projection equipment and sound system were installed. All of the marble in the theater was cleaned and repolished by the same company that originally installed it almost 40 years earlier.

Some of the original plaster work shows through a modern renovation.

In July 1977, the theater was sold to Theater Management Associates, who turned it into a triplex. The main level was divided into two 500 seat theaters, and the 1,200 seats on the balcony. The Fabian reopened in late 1977 as the Fabian 1-2-3. Two additional screens were added to the stage area in the early 1980s. The Fabian closed in late 1993.

The proscenium arch was covered up during the 1977 triplexing of the theater.

After being closed for over ten years, demolition of the Fabian was approved by New Jersey’s Department of Environmental Protection in 2004. The site was slated to become office space and parking for the Paterson Board of Education, but the project was never executed. The theater was gutted to make way for condos and retail space in 2011.

A closeup of the mural in the theater’s foyer.

Another look at the back of the auditorium from the stage.

These dormitories are the Farm Colony’s oldest structures.

At the center of Staten Island lies a bucolic expanse of ancient forest, a city-owned amalgam of parks, scout camps, and overgrown lots collectively termed the Greenbelt. It’s an area known for its natural beauty, its murders, and its ruins—on the southern rim, off Brielle Avenue, there’s not one but two historic hospitals that are crumbling to oblivion. The grounds of Sea View Hospital and the New York City Farm Colony may be the most forgotten quarter of the forgotten borough, representing New Yorks’ highest concentration of derelict buildings, with over two dozen scattered through 300 acres of mostly wooded land.

What’s left of the Farm Colony only comes out in the winter—from May to November, thick greenery conceals the battered rubblestone facades of its twelve remaining structures—over forty years of neglect, trees have reclaimed the grounds.  The forest bends when the wind gusts, groaning like a legion of creaky doors.  In areas that had once been cleared for farmland, thorns amass in undulating hillocks, hooking and scoring the flesh of any who dare to trudge through the overgrowth.  Some of the vines have adhered to the ruins of the oldest buildings, whose interiors have almost completely collapsed, leaving only a tangle of splintered beams and nail-studded boards. If you peek through the window of one of these wrecks, there’s a German Expressionist nightmare of canted doorways and lurching walls.

These dormitories replaced the charmless farmhouses of the Richmond County Poor Farm, which had operated on the spot since 1829 to house and rehabilitate New York City’s aging poor.  By the time Staten Island was incorporated as a borough of New York City, the Poor Farm was renamed the Farm Colony.  With distinctive gambrel roofs modeled in the Dutch Colonial Style, the buildings constructed in this period were designed to evoke the ease of rural living, avoiding an institutional design to reflect changing attitudes in the treatment of the poor.

In colonial times, poverty was equated with deviancy, and the care of dependents was traditionally left to the Church, but by the 19th Century, governments across the United States began constructing state-run institutions to house the poor, infirm, mentally ill, and developmentally disabled.  This was the era of the farm colonies, when able-bodied inmates were expected to work in exchange for their room and board.

200 residents could grow enough vegetables to feed 3,000, which was more than enough to share with other institutions across the city, including City Hospital on Blackwell’s Island.  With the construction of several new dormitories in the 30s, the population quickly expanded to over 1,000, and started to exhibit a perplexing problem.  As early as 1910, 75% of the residents were over 50, a quarter over 70, and the majority were unfit for manual labor.

Light sneaks through a boarded window into the close quarters of a former inmate dormitory.

By 1925, farm work was no longer mandatory, but many residents enjoyed the perks of voluntary farming and maintenance jobs.  Tokens could be exchanged for tobacco, pipes, and candy, and those who worked got first priority in the dining hall.  Anecdotes from the simple lives of this isolated community scatter the archives of the New York Times.  Heated horseshoe rivalries, band performances, and handicraft sales were among the most prominent events of a life lived at the Farm Colony.

The Farm Colony was in many ways idyllic, but not without its controversies.  Like all institutions in this period, the facility was guilty of overcrowding at times.  In 1934, a hospitals commissioner was shocked to discover that many of the Colony’s 200 employees were habitually intoxicated, resulting in the resignation of the superintendent and his second in command.  By the 1950s, the facility had become a geriatric hospital.  The second half of the 20th Century marked a steady decline in residency.  Increased prosperity nationwide and the introduction of social security further depleted the population, and the property was abandoned in 1975.

Though the area was designated a historic district in 1985, next to nothing has been done to protect the buildings.  Thought to be hazardous to children playing at a nearby ballfield, a morgue was demolished in 1999, ruffling the feathers of the borough’s preservationists.  The city has been trying to drum up interest in the site over the last decade, briefly considering it as the site of a new police academy, and shortlisting the Farm Colony as a possible location for a school of engineering, but they’ve repeatedly been unable to attract an interested party.  City council member James Oddo, who called the Farm Colony the “bane of his existence”, made another appeal in 2012 for expressions of interest.  Lack of access to mass transit may be partially to blame for the lack of response.  As another piece of Staten Island’s architectural legacy falls to its knees, it serves as a reminder that a bureaucratic designation is less than half the battle.

The gambrel roofs of the older buildings hearken back to a period long before their hundred year history.

Generations of vandalism have eviscerated the interiors of the Farm Colony’s remaining buildings.  Inside, little has been left to catch the eye.  Floors are strewn with rubble.  Plaster dust accrues in drifts, exposing a patchwork of masonry.  Wintry details complement the desolation—a broken windowpane bearded with icicles, hallways inundated with frozen pools.  Juvenile graffiti covers every surface, except on the ground floors, where the building has been sealed off with cinderblocks in an unsuccessful attempt to keep out intruders.  These corridors are intensely, eerily dark, and all but untraveled.  Featherweight vines dangle from the ceilings of the blackest chambers like some alien weed.  A single breath seems to cloud these rooms with fog, otherwise they’re empty.  To find any artifacts one must head underground.  Barely visible in the basement gloom, piles of old laundry bloom with mold, chairs are devoured by rust.

A dank basement room carpeted with coils of wire.

The Farm Colony may be decrepit, but don’t call it desolate.  Even with temperatures below freezing, the grounds experience a weekend rush.  If you plan to visit, be prepared to dodge a few paintballs, it’s one of the most popular pastimes here at the Colony. (Visitors have equipped the grounds with an elaborate field of obstacles pilfered from the buildings.)  Elsewhere, the grounds are littered with all the tokens of a high school hangout.  Beer cans, cigarette stubs, and junk food wrappers pave the walkways.  At night, these lanes are crowded with teenagers, who’ve come to escape their parents and affirm their friendships by way of getting scared.  Fearing boredom above all, they enter the Greenbelt ruins in spite of the warning of a cautionary tale.

Legends of a serial killer called Cropsey have spread through this part of Staten Island for as long as anyone can remember; it’s a fiction intwined with truth.  The land surrounding the Farm Colony is haunted by a history of real-life horrors, starting in the 1920s with the abduction and murder of a seven-year-old boy, who some had seen walking into the woods with an elderly man on the day of his disappearance. (The crime prompted an investigation of Farm Colony residents and staff, but nothing turned up that could implicate anyone in the crime.)

Later, sinister abuses at the nearby Willowbrook State School for the developmentally disabled cast a pall over the area.  Andre Rand, a former orderly at the facility, is thought to be responsible for a series of child murders that shocked the borough in the 70s and 80s.  Rumor has it he lived in the tunnels under the abandoned hospital, and it’s confirmed that he set up camp on the grounds.  In 1987, the body of Jennifer Shweiger was found buried in a shallow grave not far from his campsite.  Most of Willowbrook was renovated and incorporated into the College of Staten Island in the 1990s.  In the intervening years, the Farm Colony has taken its place in the collective imagination as the site most associated with the Cropsey legend.

The Farm Colony has never been open to the public, but that hasn’t stopped it from becoming a shared space.  Though some would call it useless, ugly, or appalling, the youth of Staten Island has somehow endowed this place with meaning and mystique.  Its value is written in the dust, just count the footprints.  Through fogbanked mornings, orange autumns, and torrid summer nights, the Colony beckons—a wilderness in which to be wild, a victim to bear our destructive instincts, a place to harbor our fears, and face them.

The sun sets on the Farm Colony.

Graffiti in the dining hall…

…and a devastated hallway on the top floor.

The gate left open to the laundry and industrial building.

Inside the cavernous industrial building, another popular spot for graffiti.

The unadorned Nurses Residence, once the insane pavilion, sits across from the paintball area.

Inside one of the four H-shaped dormitories, a staircase landing strewn with rubble.

Light leaks in a dark chamber.

Can you identify these vines (or roots) growing in a pitch black basement room?

What appears to be a former laundry room, the floor is covered with moldy slippers, blankets, and clothes.

The last room standing in the three oldest dormitories is on the verge of collapse.

For a closer look at the legends surrounding the Farm Colony and the case of Andre Rand, watch the documentary Cropsey, available on Netflix.

For more on New York City’s abandoned institutions, check out Letchworth Village:

Legend Tripping in Letchworth Village

Welcome to the Abandoned Japan blog. My name is Kurt Bell and I am delighted that you have taken some time to share a little of Japan with me. I’m available on Facebook and Google+ if you have questions or just want to chat and say hi. I can also be found at the JVLOG forum with other Japan-related content creators. All links are listed below. I look forward to meeting you on-line. Have a great day!

Follow me on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/softypapa

Be my friend on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/LylesBrother

On Google+
https://plus.google.com/u/0/108027407488568902619/posts

At the JVLOG forum (my username there is “softypapa”):
http://jvlog.org

You can also reach me via email at the following address: softypapa@gmail.com

—-

The Path of Wildness is easy to find
The course of a stream
Leaves blown in the wind
A beast’s track through the brush
And the direction of our first inclination

The Path of Wildness is an answer and response to a prescribed way of life which may leave some individuals with a sense that their living is little more than a series of pre-determined, step-like episodes between birth and death. The stages of living between these events: childhood, adolescence, adulthood, parenthood and senior are themselves natural and in accord with the needs of the species and most individuals. Many find their satisfaction in living this course and to these individuals I have little or nothing to say. Others though long for something more; something innate, genetic and seemingly calling. Adventure and change can give a degree of satisfaction and relief yet even these may seem too tame. To those who feel drawn to something beyond the entertainment and stimulation of senses I offer a walk along The Path of Wildness. Don’t bother penciling the event in your schedule, preparing a pack with goodies and supplies or even inviting a friend along, for this experience is along the course of your first inclination and you must surely always go alone.

The Path of Wildness Resources

• Homepage
• Facebook page
• Twitter feed