Fairfield Hills State Hospital

Fairfield Hills was a psychiatric hospital from 1931 until 1995. The need for an additional hospital in Connecticut was due to the overcrowding of two other state hospitals and, at one point, housed over 4,000 patients, 20 doctors, 50 nurses, and 100 assorted other employees. Treatment at this facility was standard for the times and consisted of hydrotherapy, patient seclusion, shock therapy, electroconvulsive therapy, and frontal lobotomy. When the idea that more inclusive and less isolating environments are more productive in the treating of individuals with mental illness emerged, many psychiatric hospitals were closed. In the case of Fairfield Hills, deinstitutionalization led to remaining patients being relocated to Connecticut Valley Hospital in Middletown. In 2004 the town of Newtown acquired the campus from the state of Connecticut and has since filled in the underground tunnel system and either redeveloped or demolished almost every building on the property.