Saturday

the willard village

these are some images of the willard state hospital.
willard grew into a sizeable village,
relying heavily on unpaid patient labor to sustain its operation.
the patients that worked in the farm, 
bakery and kitchens provided most of the food for the inmates and staff.
it's industrial shops produced clothing, shoes, even the pine caskets used to bury patients in the hospital's cemetery.
the hospital's original purpose as a bucolic rural retreat
was lost in the grim realities of the institutional life.
in the mid 1950's, they started using newly developed 
antipsychotic drugs to control patients crammed
into ever-tighter living quarters.
more than 50,000 patients were admitted to willard 
during its 126-year history,
and nearly half of those died there.
some of those grave markers are just a number.
most of them are un-marked.

Monday

as is's at the flea market

a day at the flea market.
i walked around for about four and a half hours searching for things that were slightly damaged and needed a home.
findings i found...
1. an old brown german wind up rabbit eating a blade of grass.
2. a small black microscope.
3. a pair of black no. 9 french military skibbies.
4. a piles of old photographs including one of a family having a picnic by a lake on a small pier, a couple playing the apple on the neck game, two dogs [ one wearing a tutu ] sitting up doing a trick on a table, some white baby bunnies on a table with a man in a bowler hat, and others...
5. a bell jar.
6. a taupe colored utilitarian type dress in almost perfect condition [ i was holding it up to me and an older woman who was walking by, with an eastern european accent or possibly russian, told me i would look beautiful in it...so i believed her.]
i took a break and had a hot dog lunch with extra onions on top. as i leaned on the pillar- next to me were the two kids from 'mystery train' [well' they were similar]... having a hot dog lunch too. they had chili on top of theirs. they were standing next to their old suit case finds and looked as though they were really waiting for the train.
...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJNDcMfSQ4Q
...
i managed to spend no more than forty dollars and although everything was sold to me as is...i really found some wonderful treasures.