Ron and Mike,
I've spent time over the past few days reading all of what has been posted and I am amazed by your stories. I can't even imagine the courage that you two men have. I'm 17 and I live in Kingsley, which is about a 15 minute drive from TC. I feel like I have a totally new understanding for the state hospital that most local teens don't. Everybody around here knows something, ghost stories mainly, and I think that very few people know the facts. It's very sad to see what people have done to the place - grafitti is everywhere, and nearly everything is broken or borded up. My best friend and I (don't judge me, I'm just a stupid curious kid, lol) got into one of the buildings the other day (either 32 or 34 do you know what those buildings were?) and there were "bloody handprints" or "help me" or "don't look behind you" painted on the walls, it makes me so angry, especially after reading about the two (or 3 I hope that Amy will someday find the courage to write about her experience) people don't understand or just don't care that these people who suffered are REAL and so are their memories they have to live with daily. I have all of the respect in the world for you! I hope that you can continue to share stories from your lives, after reading everything you seem like old friends.
Katrina

I'm sorry that I wrote so much, I just have a lot to say. After reading 17 pages, there are a lot of thoughts built up. I will share them a little at a time I don't want to overwhelm you!

Katrina

32-34 were Cottages.

Mike

Don't worry about how much you've typed, I for one would like to hear your thoughts about the haunted castle and what it like these days.

The last time I saw Kingsley it was a very small town, even smaller than Mesick or Harrietta.
I'm from Cadillac.

Mike

Building 34 was converted and remodeled and was the Girls Children ward in 1970 when the new Children Hospital was built. Building 36 was the Child male ward. I was lucky, I was in the the new hospital Building 46-A.
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Feel free to ask questions and pass the word that we are here answering them correctly.
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click image for a full-sized view

P/S also pass the word on the website http://www.hall-18.com
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Ideal:
I live in Florida and cannot do this, but if a few people would have business cards made up and pass them out in the TC area, with This printed on them.

www.hall-18.com

I believe this is a nice way to educate others on the life of the children who were there.

mkfarnam wrote:The last time I saw Kingsley it was a very small town, even smaller than Mesick or Harrietta.
I'm from Cadillac.

Mike

Kingsley is still very small, we're still a little farming village, we don't even have enough people to be considered a town!

ronl wrote:P/S also pass the word on the website http://www.hall-18.com
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Ideal:
I live in Florida and cannot do this, but if a few people would have business cards made up and pass them out in the TC area

I found the hall-18 site before I found this one, and I think that it is amazing! I just wanted to see a picture of the snow white painting (a friend said her dad helped remodel the building and that the painting was not Disney's version and it was creepy. True or false?) and I found a lot more. I listened to one of your songs and enjoyed it very much. It was very Pink Floyd. I would be happy to spread the word! I was wondering how you would feel about me making a facebook group about your hall-18 cause especially your book. I don't know if that's something you've done (you seem very tech savvy) but the state hospital is a major intrest of a lot of teens, and facebook is something most everybody has.

About the buisness cards, I would be honored! I'm just not sure how to go about it. I would really like to figure something out though.

My facebook addy is http://www.facebook.com/Ronny.Larson
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An ex-cert from the book will be posted later today on http://www.hall-18.com or http://www.hall-18.com/excert-1.html , consider it like a landing page for our book

Business cards are 2 inches by 3.5 inches
Cheep Ideal:
Get a rubber stamp made with http://www.hall-18.com (without the http://) and just make a home grown card, once people look it up on the internet it will be explained.
If you do this I will give you a personal copy of the book when it comes out, you will be first in line, I will also give you the online download which I will have available on the website. If you have a paypal account I will put the money in it, to get the rubber stamp and card stock.

I think that the buisness card idea sounds great! I talked to my mom and she knows a couple of places that she's pretty sure would make stamps. I'm a pretty crafty gal, making the cards wouldn't be any big deal, nor would giving them out be. My dad has a paypal account so getting the money that way should work out just fine. I'll check on the prices of stuff in the morning.

Once in 1970 when I was on Hall-20 on a sunny Saturday, I met up with 1 guy from Hall-18 and 2 girls from Hall-7, they had parole cards from 2-4 PM.
We took a walk in the back of building 50 into the woods to make out, lol. We found the water tank, This is the first time I had seen it, the others I was with had been there before. I remember names on it from the previous decades. This was very interesting, I now see all the crap painted on it, makes me sad how some spoiled kids just destroy/deface history because it is there in their way...

click image for a full-sized view
I have seen all the other crap painted on the other buildings, this is sad too.
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The grafitti on the water tank is rather sad, but there is a knocked over tree that you can climb to get on top. I'm always tempted to climb in...

I never stop looking. Today I found a picture of the admin building, maybe the only one of it, photo taken about 1965, and as I remember it. Note the top floor, that is where our school was. The whole 3rd floor.

click image for a full-sized view
Now I am looking for a picture of the bandstand and tennis court with the mini golf course next to it.

Pool Table Rebuilt:
Our pool table on hall-18 was made in the ?? 1940's. It was real heavy with leather pockets, (no ball return) The table was made of slate and wood, no plastic.
In 1967 I remember being not allowed to go to school, for some forgotten reason, A crew of 2 came to hall-18 in the morning and they took apart our pool table. The pool table was in awful shape , the cloth material was torn and the rubber side rails were torn and the rails were dead, meaning when a ball hit them it just stopped instead of bouncing off.
I noticed the little white markers on the top rail was where the crew removed them and screws were underneath them. When noon came around the pool table was stripped of everything. The sides were on the floor. For the rest of the day the crew had this metal yard stick and a grinder and they kept adding this dust to the slate and water and grind on the slate, they told me it was making the table true with no high or low places. This guy worked all afternoon on this. The other guy rebuilt the 2 ends and 2 sides replacing all the rubber and felt. At the end of the day they stretched out the new felt on the slate and had special nails to hold it on the table. When they had it all back together they added new leather pockets and screwed them in place, then measured and measured then marked the spot where the rack spot would be on both ends of the table and glued them 2 spots to the felt. I remember them bringing a new set of pool balls, the old ones were very old and cracked and some were a different size. They took all the pool sticks away and gave us new ones all having the size in weight on the side of them. As I recall the sizes were from 16-30 I believe this was onces. I remember them giving the attendants a small case of blue pool chalk and a tip repair kit which the attendants put away in their closet. I played the first game of pool with one of the builders and I think he let me beat him, lol. This was really cool playing on a level rebuilt pool table, it was just like new.