Asylums on Mount Misery

[Long Island Gothic]

So most of us have probably wandered around Mount Misery looking for the sites of the asylums mentioned by Bill Knell. To be honest, there are very few clues to their existence except for his articles, and if it wasn't for the signs that say Mount Misery Road, I'd be hard pressed to believe Mount Misery even exists. Click here to go in depth into the history of Mount Misery and its asylums. http://longislandgothic.com/2009/01/...-mount-misery/

[Curly]

Ive heard the stories but I think most of it is bunk. There are so many stories / tales about this place without much hard evidence. It would be nice to find some sort of proof that these places really existed. Much of it seems to be heresy.....

[Long Island Gothic]

I don't really think there's any doubt from what I've been able to tell, that there was no formal asylum on Mount Misery. To begin with, there would have been no funding for it. The population of the area was far too small to have a need for an asylum, and it was too far and hard to get to for it to be a candidate for shipping patients to. By the time the area started to be developed at all, there are pretty comprehensive records for these things, and there is no mention of anything there. I searched for asylums, sanitariums, almshouses and there is nothing.

It's possible that perhaps there was a family with one or more members with mental illness, or perhaps a quarantine house during an epidemic, and maybe this could have been the germ of the myth. But so far, I've found no evidence of any of these.

There was a practice of placing the homeless, and sometimes the mentally ill on farms throughout Oyster Bay, Hempstead and Long Island, and perhaps this could have been the basis of the legend also. But once again, no evidence seems to be popping up. There was also an almshouse in Half Hollow, but that would be a bit too far to be a candidate.

What surprised me most writing this article, is I have yet to find any reference to Mount Misery in this location, other than the road sign. It's not listed on the early maps, despite all the other landmarks (Sweet Hollow, West Hills, Jayne's Hill) being easy to find. When Walt Whitman visited the Coyler House on Mt. Misery Road later in life, he also makes no mention of Mt. Misery.

The only mention of Mt. Misery by name online seems to come from Bill Knell's article, which also is the source online for the legends of the asylums and the mothman. His definition of Mt. Misery goes from Plainview north, almost to Jericho Turnpike, and east to Route 110. It's certainly feasible that the very earliest settlers called the area Mount Misery and I just haven't found the references yet, but there doesn't seem to be any one feature that can be defined as such.

In the 18th century, Jayne's Hill was known as Oakley's Hill, so that couldn't have been it. There's a high point just across Sweet Hollow Road from that, which might have been known as Mount Misery, and it's just a bit east of the northern most part of Mt. Misery Road, which would make sense.

Another indicator which would support that, is originally Mt. Misery didn't appear to take the same route it does now, even factoring in the severing of the road by Northern Parkway. The original route seemed to follow where Gwynne Road turns to a dirt track at Sweet Hollow road, then takes one of the side trails off that and winds around through the woods to where Mt. Misery turns to a dirt track on the northern section, then follows the current street on up.

[Toyandgadgetguy]

It is mentioned in one or two of the original land deeds. They're in the local library's reference section, but be forewarned... it's dry reading, and lots of it.

[Long Island Gothic]

You mean the library there at Sweet Hollow? And any idea what century we're talking?

[urethra franklin]

Good writeup as usual!

Knell specifically states that Mount Misery is the highest point on Long Island, and says Jayne’s Hill is the highest spot. But this area certainly isn’t one big hill. Jayne’s Hill, which used to be called Oakley’s Hill by the earliest settlers, not Mount Misery I might add, and is officially known as High Hill, is part of West Hills. Just across Sweet Hollow Road from there is another high point, nearly as high as Jayne’s Hill. And as that goes on over to Mt. Misery Road, it’s my guess that might by Mount Misery itself. Sweet Hollow, West Hills and Jayne’s Hill are labelled on the map, but not Mount Misery though. So that kind of pokes a hole in Knell’s theory that this whole area was Mount Misery. It seems obvious that from the beginning, these were all considered separate places. It also shows, that where we are now, and where the trail comes out on Mt. Misery Road is part of Manetto Hills. In fact, the water plant up there, which is on Mt. Misery Road proper, is distinctly labelled Manetto Hills, at least legally.

Wow this really made my head spin haha....personally, everyone I know referred to that whole area as "Mount Misery", but I don't know if any of those hills have ever been called that, probably only informally. "West Hills" is the name of the town (hamlet, really) this whole area is located in...not a topographic feature like Jayne's Hill or Mount Misery. The name has fallen into disuse, but if you look on the west side of Oakwood Road, just slightly north of Jericho Turnpike there's a vacant plot of land and a historic marker stating where the original "West Hills, NY" post office once stood. Similarly, "Manetto Hills" is what Plainview was known as prior to the 1940s or so. Any "hills" in these areas are all part of the much larger peak of the terminal moraine that runs through the center of LI.

[Long Island Gothic]

Well technically the township is of course Huntington. And looking at the 1933 and 1946 maps, it shows the whole area north of Northern State and south of Jericho Turnpike as West Hills, not just the populated area. In fact, the label on the map is in an unpopulated area. And we know that this name was in use all the way back to the late 17th century, even before Sweet Hollow was Ketcham's Hollow, and of course before it was Melville. The 33/46 maps also label the hills south of Northern Parkway as being a part of Manetto Hills.

The 1903 map shows how unpopulated the area was. The corridor along what is now 110 had about 18 parcels of farmland, stretching south to Melville, including the Whitman boyhood home, which has always been known as West Hills as well. The area around the Chichester Inn had quite a few parcels as well, including the West Hills Park which was just north of there. But all of the land, including the hills just west of 110, Sweet Hollow Road, the highlands to the west of that stretching to the county line, was owned by Robert W. DeForest and a handful of others, including the former secretary of war H.L. Stimson. In fact, DeForest's estate stretched from Jericho Turnpike all the way down to Old Country Road.

So if the northernmost part was called West Hills from the earliest days (and we know it is stretching back to the 1600s from the Huntington Town Records), and the southern part was Manetto Hills, that's what got me to wondering if Mount Misery was considered just a single feature in those hills, the same as Jayne's or Oakley's Hill and a couple of others.

[DOC]

WEST HILLS MIGHT VERY WELL BE A HAMLET BUT I DON'T THINK IT HAS IT'S OWN ZIP CODE. I THINK IT SHARES IT WITH SOUTH HUNT OR HUNT STA? NOT SURE REALLY. TO ME WEST HILLS WAS JUST A PART OF THE LOWER SOUTH HUNTINGTON AND MELVILLE AREA (WHERE I GREW UP). THERE IS AN ODD CONCRETE FOUNDATION IN THE HILLS JUST NORTH OF OLD COUNTRY ROAD, WEST OF SWEET HOLLOW ROAD. I THINK IT MAY'VE BEEN THE BASE FOR AN OLD WATER TOWER SINCE IT'S ROUND.

http://www.longislandexchange.com/towns/westhills.html

[DOC]

ZIP CODE DIRECTORY SAYS WEST HILLS IS WITHIN THE HUNTINGTON 11743 ZIP CODE. WHILE IT STILL MAY BE A HAMLET OR SECTION OF HUNTINGTON, I LIVE IN THE HAMLET OF LAUREL WHICH DOES HAVE IT'S OWN ZIP CODE AND POST OFFICE. IT IS ACTUALLY PARTLY IN RIVERHEAD TWP ON THE WEST SIDE AND SOUTHOLD TWP ON THE EAST SIDE.

[Long Island Gothic]

Is the round concrete structure in the entrance to the forest just down and across the road from the cemetery, and on top of the hill? If so, that's probably a small reservoir, which was used to irrigate a farm which used to lie at the foot of the hill and just south of there. If you take the smaller trail down the hill from it, you'll find several sections of the pipe which used to run down from there.