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Enchanted :

Enchanted

Jeff

Updated: Oct 20, 2009 7:57pm PST

Hospital :

Hospital

Jeff

Updated: Oct 20, 2009 6:51pm PST

The Busted Quarry, WV : Same old deal. Gorgeous day, look at maps, feeeeeeeeeeel this area and zone in, switch to aerial, and then go "WTF is THAT?" Looked like an abandoned castle. Or something. It turned out to be *quite* something... Welcome to the Busted Quarry gallery. The name fits for a couple reasons, one being rather visually obvious right off the bat. The other is I was caught trespassing at this location, Eeek! Yes! My first EVER, and I've trespassed in some pretty fabulous and high security places! I promised "Dixie", the great (to say nothing of eagle-eyed) security guy who busted me, the location of the quarry would remain a secret until my dying day. So I am not going to say anything other than it is in the state of West Virginia. Uh, Dixie also wanted me to pass something on to you. DON'T BOTHER. You'll get nabbed, just like I did, and they DRIVE AROUND about every hour. Dixies also says don't EVEN try to go swimming in the quarry lake. He showed me where he can see the entire area from above, and he's GONNA see you. Then there's the color of the water. I could not FAKE a color like that. No way I was takin' a dip. Not so for about 5 teenagers who were at the lake, when did Dixie say, last year, and one jumped off what I am calling "Death Rock" (don't worry, you KNOW I shot it!). and never came up. It is seriously, according to both my and Dixie's estimation, about an 80 foot drop. So, to say the security is tight here is an understatement. Liability issues and all. Now, here's the DYNO ROYALE part. Ok. So I've pretty much exhausted the shooting site itself, no problems/hassles/nothing, and was walking down this dirt road to the quarry lake. Then I hear the truck, turn around, SEE the truck, and go "Crap, I am soooooo totally busted!" I turned my ass around and started walking slowly toward the truck. I meet Dixie. "YOU KNOW YOU'RE TRESSPASSING!?!?!?!?!", he hoilers. I admitted I did. I then immediately apologized and offered to heist my butt out of there immediately, if this snarling, gum chewin, Black Ray Ban Aviator wearin' SOB was of a mind to let me. I launched into what I considered a beautiful rendition of "I'm a photographer, I leave only footprints. touch nothing, don't leave Miller Lite cans..." I offered a business card, as if that made my little trespassing faux pas legit or "OK" somehow, and he says, "Naaaa, don't gimme that. I don't wanna know who ya are, cause I'm not going to turn you in. Get in." Who am I at this point to argue? After all, I figured at worst it's a free ride to the gate, and was a long uphill hike back, So I do. And we start talking, he asks me where I'm from, I say Reston (DC), he snarls, "figgered". I start asking questions, and then from that magic moment on, I was given a personal TOUR of the friggin' place, complete with Dixie's family history, and of the quarry. Dixie was born in a company house that has long rotted away, along with many others on the grounds here. You can still see the stacked rock walls running throughout the dense woods that have now overaken everything and anything. His father worked for over 50 years at the quarry/smelting plant, and retired in 1961, Dixie and his brothers also worked long years for the quarry, the name of which I never learned. Didn't want to seem pushy or anything by asking, seein' as how I was trespassin' and all. So anyway... Dixie and I wind up being the best of pals, he drives me all over, giving me the history of this and that, and what this was, and that was, etc. He, dig this, actually POSITIONED his pickup truck so I could get a good shot of Death Rock. Deluxe! Which is the the beautiful lake and the rock shot in the gallery. A Reckless Youth of Questionable Sobriety jumped from the large monolith you see in the foreground, and sank, never to come back up from. Divers recovered him tangled in something; the depth at that spot being 40 ft..Shot it right outta Dixie's pick up truck winder. So... presented with a bit of a story, the usual skew, and many anonymous regards to my dearest Security Person pal EVER, Dixie, please enjoy The Busted Quarry. ~ Bill 10/5/09

The Busted Quarry, WV

theskewedeye

Same old deal. Gorgeous day, look at maps, feeeeeeeeeeel this area an ...

Updated: Oct 06, 2009 1:57pm PST

The Box Factory - West Virginia : As always, as I glanced at an area in northern West Virginia, I felt the Call. The Tugging. The Something's Here and Right Up Your Alley feeling. So I go. Have no clue where this was, but knew I was on the right track after the first house you see below. The following images are mostly from an abandoned box factory. As usual, presented with the usual Skew!

The Box Factory - West Virginia

theskewedeye

As always, as I glanced at an area in northern West Virginia, I felt t ...

Updated: Sep 26, 2009 10:17am PST

Industrial/Urban Decay :

Industrial/Urban Decay

mile4

Updated: Aug 16, 2009 5:47pm PST

CF&I Steelworks Administration Building : The old CF&I Administration building. The blood and such is from a haunted house.

CF&I Steelworks Administration Building

kcphoto

The old CF&I Administration building. The blood and such is from a hau ...

Updated: May 03, 2009 9:10am PST

Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum - October 2008 : I have passed through Weston, WV before, but never stopped. This time I did. I drove through town, and turned on to this street and there it was, the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum, formerly Weston State Hospital. The facility was a psychiatric hospital operated from 1864 to 1994 by the government of the U.S. state of West Virginia, in the city of Weston. So I pull up to park and notice I seem to be alone in visiting that day. Then begin to wonder just why that might be. I eventually do make my way in, and was given a personal tour of the entire hospital and grounds by a former employee and resident, complete with gross, disturbing and hieeously vivid anecdotes about daily life (and death) At Weston. She was fabulously and gruesomely honest in her recollections -- it was perfect. The below images, as always, present the Skewed View.

Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum - Octo...

theskewedeye

I have passed through Weston, WV before, but never stopped. This time ...

Updated: Dec 17, 2008 8:07pm PST

Henryton Sanitarium - November 2008 : I'd heard Henryton was easy to get into and shoot, despite warnings of asbestos, severe vandalism, and it being *almost* a TOURIST attraction. I went on two separate shoots, the first being a bit of a washout, due to being cut short by human factors. Loud, let's-bust-up-some-stuff, drunk ones apparently. So, the first time was much more of a recon mission, shall we say. I had to be invisible and able to get away quickly if things got ugly, which limited me to mostly outside stuff. Henryton site is HUGE, with many different buildings. It's easy to get to and into, and is extremely popular with roving bands of *scairt* GURLEENS sporting headband flashlights and baby blue surgical masks, the occasional clan of Goth People, and finally those that think this would be a great place to play GhostHunters with their CHIRREN, for crying out loud. For that reason, and it's rather isolated location, if you get in trouble here due to PEOPLE, which is faaaar more likely than anything from The Beyond, no one WILL hear you scream. Or if they do, TRUST me, Honeylamb, they are going to be RUNNING from yer ass as fast as they can due to being scared right into MessyPants. It's extremely dangerous from the broken glass/hazardous debris/asbestoes/structural integrity perspectives, to say nothing of the drunken vandal perpective. Some history of the place I gleaned somewhere: "The facility was established in the 1920s as a tuberculosis hospital for the "Negro" population. The hospital was converted to a facility serving the developmentally disabled population in 1962, and closed in 1985. It has been vacant since closing. However, the Maryland State Police currently use the facility on a part-time basis to train police dogs and demonstrate how to conduct searches, etc. The hospital campus consists of eighteen buildings, with a total of 228,000 square feet. The campus is located on 46 acres in the middle of a State Park. The main buildings at the hospital include three connecting multi-story structures, built between the 1920s and 1940, containing approximately 119,000 square feet. The earliest building comprised the original tuberculosis hospital. Two additions were built and renovations were made to the original building between the time of the original construction and 1940. The property is currently for sale and having trouble selling due to environmental issues and the historical value of the buildings, some of which cannot be torn down." So with all THAT outta the way, please enjoy the Skewed View of Henryton Sanitarium.

Henryton Sanitarium - November 2008

theskewedeye

I'd heard Henryton was easy to get into and shoot, despite warnings of ...

Updated: Dec 17, 2008 7:23pm PST

Lorton Prison : With gas @ $4 a gallon, and an extremely thirsty, yet trusty SUV, I've drastically curtailed my wanderings to far flung locations to satisfy my obsession with the rotting and forgotten. So, it was a gorgeous August day, and the Voice said, "Well ya know, you have something quite interesting just down the road from you in Lorton - Lorton Prison." So I discovered what looked like a perfect back door into it, and amazingly just waltzed my azz on in. The following images are from a number of locations that were the Lorton Complex, including an abandoned farm the inmates used to work. It was a very intense experience to photograph the locations due to the history of the prison, and the obvious residual energy that remains soaked into the walls. Most of the images are from the Power Plant, an UrbEx slice of heaven. A personally disturbing fact to me is the opening this September of the Max Security buildings (third to last pic in the gallery) as an ARTISTs space. There are such, how do I put this, residual energy problems here that I wouldn't even CONSIDER having a workspace here. Thank GOD they didn't go with the original plan of making the same spaces into condos! So, all that said, please enjoy what most probably are the last illicitly photographed images of what once was one of the most notorious prisons in the US.

Lorton Prison

theskewedeye

With gas @ $4 a gallon, and an extremely thirsty, yet trusty SUV, I've ...

Updated: Dec 17, 2008 6:27pm PST

Power :

Power

Jeff

Updated: Oct 28, 2008 7:05pm PST

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