The Site Of National Headlines: Burr Oak Cemetery The Burr Oak Cemetery has been the subject of national headlines on more than one occasion in the last few years … The most recent news story involved allegations of cemetery employees disinterring bodies to sell plots in the already capacity exceeded graveyard and reselling them surreptitiously

An Old VA Hospital My recent expedition to the old Manteno State Hospital complex has piqued an interest I have had in facilities like this that began with the encounter working in the basement of a Joliet Illinois penitentiary annex building of few years back that housed sex offenders and culminated in my coverage of

The Manteno State Asylum by Barek Halfhand It has been close to a decade since I have been to Manteno Illinois, and while growth and development has since peppered the predominately rural landscape with prefab-ish subdivisions along the straights of Rt 57 just north of the Manteno exit, the small town, Main Street charm beside

A sun drenched, mild mid February afternoon brought me back to the Maylake/Peabody Estate to complete the Friary edition of the site update…on a day with highs in the upper 30′s it seemed like a comparably temperate climate as I flashed back to the frost bitten, sunrise sojourn through the fields and sparsely wooded east

I took these photos over the course of a month and a half in Feb and March of ’08 …it is the progressive demolition photos of Plymouth Place retirement home…a reputedly haunted location as recounted by employees and confirmed by my own vigilance in chronicling the dismantling of what was considered the Ritz Carlton of

There is a duality associated with the Peabody Estate (tomb) legend, and most that grew up in the Chicago land area are at least vaguely cognizant of it as some of the lore is apparently founded by fact while much is the result of fabrication and the added embellishments of countless retelling the artistic license

At precisely what point does dedication become compulsion if not full blown OCD?… Is it the adrenalin rush associated with wandering through a cemetery alone in the wee hours of the night, the need to escape the mundane banality of everyday life that only the reckless abandon of extreme sports, roller coasters or an enlisted