Chemical X

 

 Chemical X (alias) is a 23 acre industrial facility that has recently found itself abandoned by all but the thousands of birds that remain to call this massive web of steel and piping home. When it was operational, it's propose was the manufacturing of a variety of organic chemical compounds, most notably Pyridine and B3.The large amount of by-product from this work had to go somewhere though, and in 1953 the state issued a "permit to discharge sewage or wastes into the waters of the State".

In the 1950's Chemical X was dumping 50,000 gallons of waste a week into six lagoons,each one measuring

about 160 feet long by 70 feet wide. By 1967 the facility had cut dumping back to around 7,000 gallons a week, this was mostly due to an EPA inspection of the lagoons in 1958 and 1960. Test results from the samples taken found traces of Arsenic, Copper, Zinc, Dichloromethane, and Di-n-Butyl Phthalate.

Due to the state's growing concerns with how to contain the contaminants from reaching a public well field, which rested 800 feet from the lagoons, and served over 2,500 residents, the state cut the use of the lagoons in 1968. The last of the lagoons were filled in the 1970's.

In the later 1970's, to keep the public safe from these contaminated lands, a fence was constructed around it's perimeter. The 5 acres of land that were once the dumping lagoons have come to be a rolling grass-covered field. Approximately 6,500 people live within a 3-mile radius of this site, the three closest residents living within 500 feet. Many of these people, including the three closest, rely upon private wells for their water...

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De Ville for the Feeble Minded

 

 Construction began in 1911 but completion of the original design did not occur until the early 1930s. The institution was planned as a "farm colony," whereby patients were put to work raising animals and growing food. Superintendent Charles S. Little told the New York Times: "In order to make this plan a success, it is necessary to begin to train the feeble minded when they are children. The feeble minded, if taken at an early age can be trained to do things better than if the education of which they are capable is postponed until the less pliable years." The site was named for William Pryor Letchworth, who served on the New York State Board of Charities from 1873 to 1896. Letchworth Village was one of the largest and most progressive facilities for the mentally retarded in the United States. Situated on 2000 acres of farmland with the Towns of Haverstraw and Stony Point. It was designed as a self-supporting community comprised of 130 field stone buildings.
The facility closed on March 31, 1996, but administrative offices remained open until 2002. The campus sprawls across the boundaries of the towns of Stony Point and Haverstraw. Some of the buildings located within Stony Point have been adaptively-reused, while much of the Haverstraw section is neglected.

 

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Cat Fancy House

 

Located in a small town in orange County NY is this tiny little house. Its been sitting vacant for years and the owners I guess want nothing to do with it and it was listed for sale, But its been that way for years now. For the most part the place was untouched with very little vandalism.

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Closed for The Season Resort

  Lets take a tour of the 355-room resort that was being renovated in Upstate NY. The lobby, nearly finished, boasts a series of crystal chandeliers the size of four-door Hyundais. The centerpiece is a five-ton dragon boat sculpture of hand-carved jade from China. Boarded up for six years with a badly leaking roof, the former Hotel was in rough shape. 

In the banquet hall the mold was this thick. The main kitchen where the roof had collapsed has been completely rebuilt and they had a crew of workers come in and acid wash the spray-painted graffiti from walls of the indoor swimming pool. 

The New Owners say they've sunk $1.7 million of their own money into the property and they've applied for a $4.5 million mortgage to finish the job. They recently bought most of the nearly new furniture from the Pines Hotel in South Fallsburg. They bought furniture for 170 hotel rooms and convention seating for 4,000. 

The New Owners are among the new investors in the changing Catskill resort industry. Once world-renowned as a luxurious getaway for Jewish vacationers from New York City, the region is slowly transforming into a more multi-cultural vacation spot. While the resorts are not abandoning their kosher clientele, many are reaching for new niches in the competitive resort and travel industry. 

The new investors are hoping to recapture the allure of the "place in the country" where Eddie Fisher and Buddy Hackett once shared a stage at the Tamarack Lodge, where Muhammad Ali trained for legendary bouts with Joe Frazier at the Concord and where Lou Goldstein led thousands in wacky rounds of "Simon Sez" at Grossinger's.

But the changes are coming after some painful losses. The so-called "Borscht Belt" landmarks like the Browns, Grossinger's, and The Pines are closed and Abandoned. 

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Brunswick Resort

The Brunswick Resort in Upstate N.Y., Like many other Borscht Belt Hotel/Resorts was converted into a summer camp for Hassidic girls. Officials of the state Department of Health ordered the property evacuated in July 2009, citing health and safety violations.

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