Windows into the soul

These are the windows of the main building for the first federally owned psychiatric facility in Washington, DC, opened in 1855 as the Government Hospital for the Insane, and most commonly referred to as St Elizabeth for the name of the 182-acre track of land on which it is built. I hate to think about what it must've been like to be committed to an asylum back in those days...

I went on a walking tour of the facility, which at its peak, housed about 8,000 patients, including some would-be and successful presidential assassins. In fact, among the remaining 300 patients is Hinckley, who tried to assassinate Ronald Reagan.

Much of the campus has fallen into disuse and is in serious disrepair. The Feds announced plans to consolidate about 60 of the Dept of Homeland Security buildings onto the grounds of St E's, at a cost of about $1.6 billion...