Menston.

 Eleven days into this new year and we are sitting in front of the very very efficient wood burner sweating whilst the temperature outside drops to frost. This new wood burner kicks. We spent time last week in junk shops looking for the Die Hard DVDs. The 1980s movies staring Bruce Willis.....and we did not find them!! so I ordered the lot from Ebay . They arrived yesterday. So we sit here by the new wood burner eating ice cream to cool us down having a movie fest from the past.

Yes .I know I suposed to be decorating the loft conversion, followed by our bedroom........well a girl has to eat and shop!......

So what did we do today? well first we actually went to the tip to get rid of the rubbish from the loft conversion ready for the carpets to be delivered. Then supermarket which just happened to be down by the old High Royds Hospital site at Menston. This has now just about all been converted into a modern village of posh flats and town houses. It's past has nearly been wiped away into a beautiful living complex. We parked the battered mucky old Fonz car next to the new BMW's and Jaguars and got out for a walk around the old part of the Hospital where the "watch towers" and ballroom would have been.

 High Royds Hospital was an abandoned paupers mental institution. Renowned lunatic asylum. Once inside never to be heard of again . very few people were ever released. It open 8th October 1888 as West riding pauper lunatic asylum. In 1988 the now discredited Jimmy Saville assaulted a patient at the 100th anniversary of the place....The hospital closed in 2003 and was abandoned. A few photos and break in fright night videos appeared on the net and rumours of patients treatment circulated and then the developers moved in .

We were at the super market just by here and I could not resist a look. there is a hidden grave yard near here....it is quite hard to stop and park....where the inmates were buried quietly. it turns out that records were kept ....but even so there are a lot of unmarked graves in a small space. I have wanted to go to the grave yard but we could never park. so I will save that for another day.

 Designed by Architect J. Vickers Edwards in the Gothic style . a 300 acres of scary history and architecture, built as a lunatic asylum, specialising in Alzheimers  and poorpers with no family and women with "Hormone imbalance" or that their husbands wanted rid. This could very easily have been me. My last husband would really have had me committed. much cheaper than a divorce......Entering the Asylum was a life long incarceration. Fortunately times and laws have changed.
The wards were dark with wooden floors. The furniture was heavy and designed to resist damage from inmates, not for comfort at all and there were no curtains or blinds at the windows. There were a few pictures on the walls, but not a lot and a caged canary in each ward it's singing was the only amusement. later in time there was television, but that was much later.
At night there was  gas lighting and cold water to wash in...when the plumbing worked .
Meals were taken in the dining room and chapel had to be attended. Smoking was never allowed.

The hospital was intended and built to be self sufficient.consisting of a library, surgery, dispensary, butchers,  dairy, shop , cobblers and all as well as a small farm that the inmates worked for their keep. The patients were housed in dormitories, this hospital had a male and female sides and the two never mixed except in the ballroom on organised social occasions. Everyone had a job. handicrafts, kitchen and laundry.There was even a railway up to the 1950s!

The hospital became out dated and was closed early in 2000s.  "unsuited to modern psychiatric practices".....

Our visit today was just on the spur of the moment. After parking up we walked through a wooden gate and up a paved path towards the old parts of the hospital......
As we passed old and new development of the existing sites I was impressed. It looks very beautiful and expensive. Having said that I would not like to live there. Is that because I know some of the history of the place? or that it is like a Goth nightmare and I got despair and longing in gulps as I walked towards the clock tower....
All of the stories I have heard about the treatment rooms and lobotomy performed here are true too as time has brought it all out. the medical records and treatments of patients are now in the public domain.

 "The report into the abuse committed by Jimmy Savile notes that he had carried out instances of abuse at High Royds Hospital in the 1980s. The report said that the assault was during a fancy dress fun run at the hospital and that the witness was credible and accepted the allegation as true.^[12] It was also alleged that Saville groped not only patients but also staff from the hospital and a porter was asked if there was a room that Savile could go to if 'he pulled one of the nurses."

^[

Since its closure, the site has been used as a film set for the film Asylum, as well as for the successful television series No Angels, Bodies,^[14] Fat Friends, Heartbeat and The Royal.^[15]

The drama Diamond Geezer starring David Jason which aired on ITV1 in March 2005 was also partly shot at High Royds.

Leeds band Kaiser Chiefs have written a song ("Highroyds") about the former hospital. Three of the band (Nick Hodgson, Nick 'Peanut' Baines and Simon Rix) used to attend St. Mary's Catholic High School, the school that faces High Royds Hospital.

The band Kasabian named their third album, West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum [sic], after the hospital after hearing about it on a TV documentary.^[16]

The hospital was the focus of a 2010 Open University documentary about asylums called Mental:A history of the Madhouse.^[17]

Anna Hope's novel The Ballroom is set in the asylum in 1911.

 This vast site can be seen for miles around and dominated the views even now........ There are many stories and books written. The Jimmy Saville scandal and all it uncovered high lighted the truths of some . I am wording with care here as I know that Saville relatives still live in the area. For those of you who missed the Jimmy Saville investigation ...google it! I am not about to put an opinion here.
Though I will say that the Saville family were once lords of the manor here and one was the first Lord mayor of Leeds. The Savilles came to Yorkshire with William The Conqueror..........The coats of arms are now partly Leeds coats of arms now. This makes this an even worse travesty unfortunately and does not help me like these buildings at all.

Mostly it is now been developed into a beautiful place to live now. The Old ballroom and watch tower are still being worked on.....

We only stayed about fifteen minutes as there are a lot of notices saying "private property" indicating that we are not very welcome to wander around.So I took some photos, and then quickly found our way back to the Fonz car and sped off home.

today we bought lunch of sandwiches and Blueberry muffins,,,,are now you see that foxed you. we decided on something different today. a different supermarket......this one does not sell chocolate eclairs anyway!!!!