The Waverly Hills Sanatorium in Louisville was built as a two-story hospital for people with Tuberculosis. Tuberculosis is a highly contagious disease, and those afflicted with it have to be quarantined from others in order to quell the spread of the disease. Because of this, many people who were diagnosed with TB in the early to mid 1900s were sent to live at the Waverly Hills TB Hospital.
It is now believed that more than 60,000 people died in the Waverly Hills Sanatorium. Additionally, the patients at Waverly Hills were often mistreated or had unethical research experiments conducted on them. Because of the high number of deaths that were occurring in the hospital, hospital workers converted a supply tunnel into a death chute where bodies were sent down to the street for pickup so that patients would not recognize how many were dying.
By the 1960s, Tuberculosis was cured and Waverly Hills was no longer needed. It was quarantined for a year and then converted into a nursing home. The nursing home was closed by the state because of allegations of patient abuse in the 1980s. For two decades, Waverly Hills was just an abandoned building, visited only by kids looking for a good scare or something to vandalize. However, it was purchased by Charlie and Tina Mattingly in 2000, and they have been in the process of renovating it since. They hope to eventually convert Waverly Hills into a hotel.
Today, Waverly Hills Sanatorium is known as one of the most haunted places in the world. It has been featured on many local and national TV and radio programs, including the Sci-Fi series Ghost Hunters. It is the home of a haunted house every Halloween and open for tours, half-night stays, and full-night stays year round.
