The old asylum at Oakland Park

Minnesota · United States · Asylum

Listed for years under the wrong town. There was never an asylum at Thief River Falls, but there was a three storey institution at Oakland Park, and it is.

This entry needed correcting before it could be told properly. It circulated for years as the old insane asylum at Thief River Falls, Minnesota. There was never an asylum at Thief River Falls. A long term resident of the town identified the building people actually meant: a three storey institution at Oakland Park.

The reports from the years when it still stood describe wheelchairs moving the length of a corridor on their own, and the impressions of former residents visible in an otherwise empty building. Some accounts claim that people who went inside came out with serious mental illness, which is the kind of claim that attaches itself to abandoned institutions everywhere and has never been substantiated at any of them.

The building is no longer standing. What people report on the site now is the same as what they reported inside it, which is unusual: most institutional hauntings end when the walls come down.

The correction matters more than the ghost story. An entire town spent years attached to a haunting that belonged somewhere else.

FAQ

Where is The old asylum at Oakland Park located?

The old asylum at Oakland Park is in Minnesota, United States.

Image: Mr. Moment from Minnesota / CC BY 2.0 / Wikimedia Commons