Ghost Adventures – Tooele Hospital – S04E26

Zak and the team head just outside Utah to Tooele to investigate perhaps one of the oddest buildings they’ve come across. It started as a poor house for the local residents, but then due to population expansion turned into an ill equipped hospital. They didn’t have the staff, funding or supplies to tend to the needs of their patients. They apparently had no morgue to deal with those that passed away.

The building now stands as a haunted attraction called Asylum 49. But there’s more. It’s not just a haunted house built out of an asylum it’s an actual nursing home for the elderly with 59 patients and a full nursing staff. Not many places can boast such a combination.

The owner claims to have seen apparitions. The nursing staff claims to have seen several different things as well. They claim there is a lady in white, a man in black and a little girl. Not much is mentioned about the nurse such as why she lingers or if she causes any mischief. Very little is known about the man in black other than he is an apparition that appears. There are multiple stories of people being attacked and scratched but is this dark figure responsible? And the little girl foretells of death. When patients start to mention her it usually signals someone is going to pass. But who is this little girl? Was she a patient? Did she lose her parents here?

Nurse Marie who gives the tour seems to be on the verge of hysterics the entire time. You get the sense that at any moment she is going to bolt from the room. No matter which room they go in she seems deathly afraid of it. If this place is so scary why does she stick around? If hates going into all these rooms why not get a job somewhere else? She seems to be tormenting herself.

Again, there are multiple accounts of people getting scratched. People have been scratched across the chest and on the back of the neck. Are they getting hung up on something and hurting themselves by accident or does something sinister roam the halls?

One thing to note, there aren’t the usual stories of abuse or bizarre experiments we’re used to hearing about from asylums. And the between clip graphics are certainly playing up that fact with lots of scenes of blood and nurses taking joy in patient suffering. Sure, the hospital had problems but did they go out of their way to hurt the patients? They’re building up the dramatic effect but I don’t get the sense it really happened. These little cutscenes are trying to build an atmosphere of something that was never there.

So what happens during the investigation?

For the second time we have some ridiculous theatrics to start the lockdown. Seriously, this is just stupid. I’m sure it was fun to do but it really comes across as juvenile. A hearse where slaves were bought and sold, now a fake ambulance where the elderly reside. This isn’t coming across as classy.

They start off in room 666 where they play with the Jacob’s ladder and try to talk with the spirits. This is where one investigator claims to have gotten scratched on the back of the neck. As Zak and Aaron start to provoke the spirits the electrical arc on the ladder climbs to the top and hovers there. The electricity seems to point toward the person yelling, first at Zak then at Aaron. It actually does this several times. Is this a machine with perfectly normal behavior or are we seeing something more? I thought this was actually pretty interesting.

In the basement Zak and Nick claim doors slam in their faces and that they hear footsteps. They capture evidence of a ball moving on its own, more footsteps and Zak jumping out of his chair at the sight of small shadow figures.

Since this is a working hospital are the footsteps and noises just patients and other workers wandering around and we should discount them? Is the Jacob’s ladder just a cool trick and it doesn’t mean anything? Is someone from the other side really calling out Zak’s full name?

I have to say I love investigations that involve asylums and hospitals. They have this past that just gets under your skin. Aside from the silliness with the skiing and showing up in the ambulance I really liked this episode.

Other Articles of Interest:

• Ghost Adventures – Asylum 49 – S14E11
• Ghost Adventures – Tuolumne Hospital – S08E03
• Ghost Adventures – Pennhurst State School and Hospital
• Savannah Tunnels – Underground Railroad, Yellow Fever, Secret Autopsies or Shanghai Route?
• Ghost Adventures – Hill View Manor S04E06
• Ghost Adventures – Clovis Wolfe Manor
• Haunted History – Pennhurst Asylum – S01E04
• Ghost Asylum – St Vincent’s Mental Asylum – S01E04
• Paranormal Lockdown – St. Ignatius Hospital – S02E04
• Paranormal Lockdown – Waverly Hills Sanatorium – S02E05