PHOTOS - A close look at New York’s North Brother Island - slideshow
North Brother Island, which lays just a few hundred yards from the Bronx in New York, was regarded as being as miserable a place as Calcutta when it was still operational. It was the home of Typhoid Mary, Mary Mallon the woman from Tyrone, who became the most notorious carrier in New York history of the disease.
The location, now mostly overgrown by plants and inhabited only by protected animals, used to serve as a quarantine zone for lepers, sufferers of typhoid fever, and drug addicts.
The Daily Mail reports that photographer and local historian in the area, Ian Ference, was given “unprecedented access” to the now deteriorating site. The images which Ference photographed of the remains at North Brother Island paint a dismal picture for what life must have been like for the inmates there.
“This has got to be one of America's most important places to visit,” said Ference. “Historically it has had a notorious and sometimes sinister reputation.”
North Brother Island was opened in 1885 as a quarantine center, only to be closed in 1963, leaving behind a “a haunting labyrinth of crumbling ruins.” The area is now patrolled by the armed coastguard members to protect the “sanctity” of the abandoned site.
“It was established as a forced quarantine camp for people suffering from infectious and often fatal diseases such as typhoid, scarlet fever, yellow fever, and typhus. There were six people suffering from leprosy confined here in wooden huts,” said Ference.
_______________
READ MORE:
How ‘Typhoid Mary’ infected countless and still haunts New York Island
New York mayoral candidate Christine Quinn refuses tainted cash
New revelations in Fox TV anchor Greg Kelly rape accusation case
_______________
Ference attributes the waves of immigrants coming to live in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions in New York to the inevitable spread of infectious diseases.
“Once the health authorities identified a person as having a communicable disease they were seized and forced to live on North Brother Island - unless they were rich enough to afford a private clinic.”
Ference added that the mortality rate was high at North Brother, while the recovery rate was low. More often than not, once people were placed in North Brother, they were never heard from again.
Officially, North Brother is only open to a select few, though some bloggers have detailed their “illicit” trips to its shores. Ference was granted access to develop the island’s history in 2008, and has made 15 trips since then.
“I'm truly fortunate to have been given this exclusive access to one of America's most significant forbidden places,” said Ference.
One of North Brother’s most famous residents was ‘Typhoid Mary,’ an Irish immigrant to New York City who was “the first healthy carrier of any disease ever to be identified.” She spent years imprisoned in North Brother’s bleak woods on two separate occasions after she was deemed a threat to the public for having transmitted the fatal disease.
PHOTOS - A close look at New York’s North Brother Island - slideshow
Below, watch this History Channel report on North Brother Island:
Switch to the desktop site to post a comment.