Glenn Dale Hospital

This 216-acre tuberculosis sanatorium in Prince George's County had 23 buildings, each with its own morgue, and has been abandoned since 1982. Explorers found toddler-sized footprints in the children's ward, a police officer emptied his gun at something he could never identify, and the phantom smell of burning flesh still drifts through the corridors.

Each of Glenn Dale Hospital's 23 buildings had its own morgue. That tells you everything about the survival rate.

Built in 1934, the sprawling 216-acre complex in Prince George's County was designed by architects Albert L. Harris and Nathan C. Wyeth (who also designed the Key Bridge and the original Oval Office). Washington D.C. ranked fourth among American cities for tuberculosis deaths, and patients were shuttled 15 miles outside the city to this campus of Georgian Revival brick buildings where the preferred treatment was fresh air and sunshine. Patients spent hours on rooftop sun decks and expansive solariums. Children played on rooftop playgrounds. Underground tunnels connected the children's and adult buildings so people could move between them in bad weather.

For many, Glenn Dale was the last place they'd ever see. TB was often a death sentence, and the stigma was so heavy that families refused to tell anyone where their loved ones had gone. By the late 1950s, antibiotics had reduced treatment to a three-month to two-year medication course, and the sanatoriums built specifically for isolation became unnecessary. Glenn Dale was repurposed as a nursing home for indigent patients in 1960 before finally closing in 1982 due to asbestos contamination.

The ghost stories started almost immediately after the last staff member locked the doors. Explorers who slipped past the fences found tiny footprints in the dust of the children's ward in 1995, no larger than a toddler's. One team member described a little girl following them through the building, though she vanished when they tried to photograph her. The morgue in the adult building's basement became the most active spot, with strange sounds and an overwhelming feeling of dread reported by anyone who went down there.

The police officer story is the one locals remember. A patrolman was making his usual rounds through the empty campus late one night. Neighbors across the street heard gunshots and called for backup. When officers arrived, they found their colleague standing frozen, staring straight ahead, unable to speak. He had emptied his entire magazine at something. Whatever it was, it was never found. He could never explain what he saw.

A woman in white has been spotted dancing near windows before disappearing. A pack of spectral black dogs circles the Children's Hospital at night. Dark figures move through the underground tunnels. Visitors report their phones going haywire: receiving random calls, playing music without being touched, connecting to Bluetooth devices that don't exist. Doors slam when there's no wind. Voices call people by name from empty rooms.

The Goatman legend orbits Glenn Dale too, though it doesn't belong to the hospital. The half-man, half-goat creature with an axe is a Prince George's County legend with roots older than the sanatorium. Some versions claim the creature escaped from the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center. Historians point out that the hospital was never a psychiatric facility, despite the persistent rumor. But the Goatman sightings near the grounds keep happening.

The smell is what sticks with people who've been inside. Explorers have reported the odor of burning flesh drifting through the corridors, which fed rumors of on-site cremations. Records show the incinerator only burned medical waste, not bodies. But the phantom odor persists, drifting through hallways where thousands of TB patients spent their final months breathing that "fresh Maryland air" the doctors promised would save them.

Glenn Dale was added to the National Register of Historic Places in November 2011. The buildings have been vacant for over four decades now, deteriorating through neglect and vandalism. Preservation Maryland has pushed to save the campus, but nobody has figured out what to do with 23 Georgian Revival buildings full of asbestos, each with its own little room built specifically for the dead.