Abandoned Rockaway Queens
Neponsit Health Center

Sitting on the shoreline of Jacob Riis Park in the Rockaways is a decaying old hospital, the Neponsit Health Center… previously known as the The Nesponsit Beach Hospital for Children. It was a project of muckraker Jacob Riis who had exposed squalid living conditions in the tenements of New York City’s Five Points. The beach hospital, backed by Rockefeller and Carnegie big money, offered heliotropic treatment for children with tuberculosis, a bacterial lung infection that had spread rampantly in the crowded tenements.

Ah the healing power of sun, air and salt water! But now the hospital remains empty, its last residents–the elderly–were abruptly whisked out of its premises in the cover of night by the shady Giuliani causing the death of two frail patients and a third to be lost for two weeks. (source) Some believe the hospital was vacated not because it was deemed unsafe after a coastal storm hit badly in 1998, but because the slime bucket had hopes of redeveloping. A resident of the area blamed the swift move of patients on the outcry of conservative neighbors who did want to co-mingle with patients. Whichever the case, the grounds are not able to be redeveloped into anything other than another hospital or a public park, as per the original deed… And so it sits.

Ah, the sea air and streams of sun pouring through its windows was calling me inside. Unfortunately it was surrounded by razor wire. And a guard in a booth by its entrance sat motionless at a table staring at a wall, which was odd but still an effective deterrent.

It still was nice to photograph its exterior.

During the years I visited this beach I had always overlooked this structure, never giving it a looksie as I thought it was an administrative building or another bathhouse… Even when, on separate missions, I sought out the abandoned hospital with, apparently, an incorrect address. How foolish I am sometimes. There it was impossible to ignore right on the shore.

Not much happening at the Social Hall.

My new favorite beach. The one that has the abandoned sanatorium on it. Thanks, New York City.