{"nrhp_refnum":"86000057","name":"Pennsylvania State Lunatic Hospital","other_names":["Harrisburg State Hospital"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"Cameron St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Harrisburg","county":"Dauphin County","state":"PA","lat":40.28389680250004,"lon":-76.87456655520133,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1986-01-08","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture","Social History"],"significance_levels":["state"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A former state psychiatric hospital on a hilltop in the northern section of Harrisburg, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, established as the Pennsylvania State Lunatic Hospital with its first structures completed in 1851. The campus grew from 130 acres to over 1000 acres and includes about 70 buildings, parkland and farmland.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the hospital was Pennsylvania's first state mental institution and that its buildings and grounds illustrate a transition between the Kirkbride plan and the Cottage Plan of institutional design. It also cites the work of significant Pennsylvania architects, including John Haviland, Addison Hutton and John A. Dempwolf, and the consistent Colonial Revival character of the later buildings.","narrative":"Set on a hilltop north of Harrisburg, the Pennsylvania State Lunatic Hospital was authorized by an act of the Pennsylvania General Assembly in 1845 and opened its first structures in 1851. Its original Centre Building, designed by John Haviland, followed the linear Kirkbride plan that Thomas S. Kirkbride developed with architect Samuel Sloan. Late in the nineteenth century, overcrowding led to the replacement of most original buildings with substantial brick and stone structures arranged in a symmetrical layout that the hospital records describe as following the Cottage Plan. The campus is regarded as a transitional design between these two systems. Addison Hutton, John A. Dempwolf and Charles H. Lloyd designed most of the later buildings in a consistent Colonial Revival style using local Hummelstown brownstone. The hospital was listed for its architecture and its role in the development of public mental health care in Pennsylvania.","period_of_significance":"1851-1935","architect_builder":"John Haviland (Centre Building); Addison Hutton; John A. Dempwolf; Charles H. Lloyd","architectural_style":"Kirkbride plan; Cottage Plan; Colonial Revival","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"The document states that many buildings are vacant today because of decreased patient population and non-compliance with fire and safety codes.","vacant_flag":true,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.1-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 17:11:34.603397-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_PA/86000057.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/86000057/860b251e4c-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/86000057/860b251e4c-1600.webp","licence":"CC0","author":"Smallbones","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Admin_Building_Harrisburg_PA_Hospital.JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Smallbones</a>, <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/deed.en\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Admin_Building_Harrisburg_PA_Hospital.JPG"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/71995827","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrisburg_State_Hospital","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5665293"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/pennsylvania/dauphin-county/pennsylvania-state-lunatic-hospital-86000057/"}