The Renewal of Holy Land USA

For decades, Holy Land USA has been a post-nuclear Road Warrior vision of the Holy land, perched on a bluff overlooking Waterbury. It's a fascinating and horrifying wonder of neglect -- a miniature Bethlehem, impenetrable assemblages of junk, creepy tunnels and blasted out buildings, stories of gang murders and a mysterious order of nuns.

Amidst this sprawling squalor are two unlikely items. A tall high tech cross of steel, visible for miles, would light up at night. The joke is that locals grow up believing Christ was electrocuted on the cross. More striking is the large "Hollywood"-style sign that nightly illuminates the words: Holy Land USA.

Holy Land USA burst onto the rocky slopes of Pine Hill in the early 1950s, when lawyer and evangelist John Greco responded to a personal message from God (or perhaps a broadcast message also received by the builder of Alabama's Ave Maria Grotto, Iowa's Grotto of the Redemption, and other 20th century divine labors). He directed volunteers who built hundreds of structures, grottos and educational dioramas, using discarded plywood, tin siding, chicken wire, cement and fragments of religious statuary.

Holy Land USA was a legitimate vacation destination for families in the 1960s and '70s, drawing as many as 44,000 visitors a year. It was a must-see stop for church groups and pilgrimage busses. Today, evidence can be found of a large parking lot, remnants of a gift shop, and assorted outbuildings.

The 17-acre attraction had begun its long slide into the Pit, closing a few years before Greco's death in 1986, at the age of 91. He willed the land and his testament of personal faith to the Religious Teachers Fillipini of Bristol.

Over the years, an order of nuns have attempted a degree of maintenance -- for instance, the white rocks that line the entrance wall always seem freshly painted. But the park at large has been battered by the elements, rampaging teenagers and scavengers. The nuns have declined nearly all offers of outside help by preservationists and others. A group of Boy Scouts working towards their Eagle badges in 1997 were allowed to renovate the Hollywood-style sign [1996 "before" view] as a community service project. In 2008 the 56-ft. tall metal and fiberglass panel cross was dismantled for replacement by a newer one that will continue to be lit at night.

The fate of Holy Land USA remains uncertain. It is regarded as a city landmark, visible to passing motorists on I-84. Brass Mill Center, a new 150-store mall on one side of the hill, radiates prosperity -- but perhaps threatens secular-humanizing bulldozers for mini-Bethelehem. Rough-looking full-sized neighborhoods around the rest of Pine Hill don't bode well for any relief from juvenile vandalism.

Renewal of Holy Land in Waterbury attracts hundreds for Mass

Posted: Aug 11, 2018 10:05 PM EDTUpdated: Aug 11, 2018 10:05 PM EDT

By WFSB/AP

(WFSB)

WATERBURY, CT (WFSB/AP) -

Hundreds of people, clad in ponchos and carrying umbrellas, climbed the hillside for a Mass at Holy Land in Waterbury on Saturday.

The landmark of Holy Land USA in the Brass City was once a religious theme park, but after years of disrepair, the church and monument are celebrating its renewal on Saturday afternoon.

For Waterbury resident, Rosemary Lamana, Holy Land is a special place where she said she reconnects her faith.

“You feel a sense of hope because things are coming back that were good. That were good,” said Lamana.

The event will celebrate the late Reverend Michael McGivney, who created the Knights of Columbus fraternal Catholic group in 1882 and is being considered for sainthood by the Vatican.

McGivney was a Waterbury native and assistant pastor at St. Mary's Church in New Haven when he founded the group.

Hartford Archbishop Leonard Blair led the ceremony.

The 18-acre property was once a religious theme park until it closed in 1984.

Lamana showed a picture to Channel 3 News Reporter, Jennifer Lee of herself as a girl in 1959 at the park.

“That was me when I was just a babe,” said Lamana. “There were people everywhere.”

Recently, Mayor Neil O’Leary bought the property with another businessman and sits on the Board of Holy Land U.S.A.

“We have it in the deed that it will never be anything but Holy Land USA,” said Mayor Neil O'Leary.

The giant cross stands 65 feet high and 26 feet wide.

Mayor O’Leary told Channel 3 the cross always stood as the symbol of the City of Waterbury today, and back in the 1960s and 70s.

He said Holy Land attracted more than 40,000 people to the park every single year.

“It's beautiful, it's magnificent and most importantly, it brings people from all over the country here as a destination place and it's a place of peace. It's a place of prayer, meditation and we're really proud of it,” said O’Leary.

Copyright 2018 WFSB (Meredith Corporation). All rights reserved

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Matteawan State Hospital for the Criminally Insane

Matteawan State Hospital for the Criminally Insane was established in 1892 as the Matteawan State Hospital by an 1892 law (Chapter 81), Matteawan functioned as a hospital for insane criminals. The new hospital confined and treated individuals committed to it by criminal courts and inmates who were declared insane while serving their sentences at State institutions. The Superintendent of State Prisons had control over the hospital.

In 1886, a legislative commission recommended the purchase of the 246-acre Dates Farm in the village of Matteawan for $25,000, or just over $100 per acre. The site was accessible by rail and offered good tillable land, pure water and pleasant scenery between the Hudson River and the Fishkill Mountains An architect was hired to draw plans for buildings with "an abundance of light and ventilation" to accommodate 550 patients. In April 1892, the Asylum for Insane Criminals, with 261 patients, was relocated from Auburn to its new site. The following year, it was renamed Matteawan State Hospital, But 550 beds were not enough. Seven years later, in 1899, another prison mental hospital was built on the grounds of Clinton. Dannemora would hold male convicts becoming insane while serving their sentences, and had the power to retain them if they remained insane at expiration of their sentences. Matteawan would hold unconvicted males as well as females in both categories. Except for tighter security, Matteawan functioned the same as the state's civil hospitals. Until the 1950's and thorazine, doctors prescribed the program of "moral treatment" developed in the early 1800's. It consisted of kind and gentle treatment in a stress-free, highly routine environment. Patients who were capable were assigned to a work program (often called "occupational therapy"): cooking, maintenance, farming and making baskets, rugs, clothing and bedsheets. Patients were given outdoor exercise in the courtyards twice daily and motion pictures were shown weekly. Radios and phonographs were available on the wards. Patients played softball, tennis, bowling, tennis, handball, shuffleboard, volleyball, chess, checkers, cards, gymnastics, ping pong and quoits (similar to horseshoes but with iron rings). At Christmas and other special occasions, there were teas for the women, smokes for the men and "vaudeville entertainments" staged by patients and staff. By 1949, new treatments had been added to the traditional moral treatment (now called "milieu therapy"). Electric and insulin shock treatments were now being used extensively, hypnosis and group therapy were employed and three lobotomies had been performed. From Matteawan's opening, the proportion of chronic and dangerous patients - who could never be released - steadily rose, and so did the hospital count. Capacity was gradually increased to about 1,000, but overcrowding continued. In 1949, there were nearly 1,500 men and 250 women. Outwardly, the madhouse atop Asylum Road was usually quiet. Its most notorious patient was probably George Metesky, the Mad Bomber. But Metesky caused no problems, and after his release lived uneventfully outside the state. Escape attempts offered occasional excitement. In 1933, four patients obtained pistols and held two attendants in a locked ward. State Police were called in and, when one of the patients pointed a gun, he was shot and killed by a trooper. The End of the Prison Hospitals By the mid- 1960's, the DOCS held approximately 3,000 patients at Matteawan and Dannemora state hospitals some serving sentence, some held past their sentences and many confined without ever having been convicted. Within a dozen years, all 3,000 would be gone. A series of court decisions ended the relatively free and easy procedures under which Matteawan and Dannemora had operated. Simply put, everyone sent there stayed until the superintendent approved their release. In many eases, persons committed for minor offenses were confined for 30 and 40 years. Now, coinciding with a period in American history when faith in the judgment of “experts" was eroding, courts put a stop to the "unbridled discretion" exercised by mental institution superintendents. First, the courts established that transfer to Matteawan or Dannemora would require the same procedures, including the right to a court hearing, as involuntary commitments of ordinary citizens to civil mental hospitals. A later decision established that nobody could be held in a correctional institution beyond their maximum sentence (if still dangerous, they could be committed to a civil hospital). Further decisions eliminated the transfer of "dangerous civil patients," and then of persons found not guilty by reason of insanity, to institutions where convicted persons were also held. The effect of these decisions was to empty the prison mental hospitals. Dannemora was the first to go, in 1972. For another five years, Matteawan held convicted patients only, with all other categories of the criminally insane going to the Department of Mental Hygiene. Information found on www.correctionhistory.org/html/chronicl/docs2day/fishkill.html

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Children of the 'Burbs

This is the Children's Center of  Malone Psychiatric Center provides treatment, rehabilitation, and support to adults 18 and older.  As well as Children in there own ward with severe and complex mental illness.

Contemporary treatment is offered for persons whose mental illness requires hospitalization. The focus is on treatment and stabilization, with the goal of preparing the patient for return to his or her community. MPC emphasizes medication management, family support, activities that build social, vocational and educational skills, and careful aftercare planning in accomplishing this goal. Specializing in intermediate and extended inpatient treatment, MPC also provides supportive residential care a Residential Care Facility for Adults and a State Operated Community Residence on campus. In addition, MPC provides varying levels of community based mental health services in New York counties and a specialized statewide service for people who are deaf and mentally ill.

Located in NY, MPC shares a multi-service campus with other state and voluntary agencies. Included on this 600-acre campus is the Nathan Kline Institute (NKI), a distinguished OMH research facility affiliated with the New York University Department of Psychiatry.
MPC is part of a cooperative network of county, voluntary, and state mental health providers serving Hudson Valley and parts of New York City. This network offers an array of clinical, social, residential, vocational, educational and case management services specializing in intermediate and extended inpatient treatment, supportive residential care, and comprehensive community based treatment and support.

 

 

 

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