{"nrhp_refnum":"07000766","name":"Western State Hospital (Boundary Increase II)","other_names":["Western State Hospital Steam Generating Plant","VDHR File No. 132-0009-0021"],"category":"district","location":{"address":"301 Greenville Ave., adjacent to NE corner of VA 11 and VA 250","address_restricted":false,"city":"Staunton (Independent City)","county":"Staunton","state":"VA","lat":38.14631218050005,"lon":-79.06621302347078,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2007-07-24","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Health/Medicine"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"The steam generating plant site for Western State Hospital in Staunton, Virginia, added to the existing hospital historic district as a boundary increase. It centers on a boiler plant built circa 1949 and includes four earlier resources from the 1895-era complex.","why_significant":"The plant supplied steam heat to Western State Hospital from 1896 until the site closed in 2002, and to the Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind from 1914. The hospital could not have operated without it. The nomination also notes its Art Deco design and its reuse of earlier elements such as the coal trestle and smokestack.","narrative":"This boundary increase adds the steam plant site to the Western State Hospital Historic District in Staunton. The main building, a one-story brick boiler house built around 1949, replaced an 1895-era plant on the same ground. Designed in an Art Deco style by the state's institutional engineering office rather than a named architect, it has stepped-back facades, brick pilasters and large banks of metal casement windows. Four earlier resources remain: a coal trestle from about 1899, a secondary smokestack, a storage building under the trestle, and an ash silo. The plant heated the hospital from 1896 until the site closed in 2002, and it also served the Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind. A 1929 fire left the hospital's roughly 2,000 patients without heat in zero-degree weather until emergency steam arrived. The site was listed for its role in health and medicine and as a physical link between two major state institutions. It is now vacant.","period_of_significance":"1800 - 1957 (entire district period of significance)","architect_builder":"Commonwealth of Virginia","architectural_style":"Modern Movement: Art Deco","criteria":["A"],"status_note":"Listed as vacant/not in use; the form says the hospital site was vacated in 2002 and the building remains remarkably unmodified. A private owner plans a certified rehabilitation.","vacant_flag":true,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:52:02.436016-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/37/6838/41683837/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_VA/07000766.pdf"},"photo":null,"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/41683837","wikipedia":null,"wikidata":null},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/virginia/staunton/western-state-hospital-boundary-increase-ii-07000766/"}