The building in this video is called both Whitman Hall and Building 11. It was built in 1915, four years after Letchworth Village opened. I'm assuming it was the eleventh building built, but maybe not. Some of the buildings were designated by letters or letter-number combinations.
Whitman Hall was used as an office building for professionals. One former staff member told me that social workers, among others, worked here.
In 2012, an urban explorer entered Whitman Hall and made a video showing confidential medical and personnel records, pill bottles, and various other items on the floor inside the building. That suggests that the building may have housed offices for medical and human resources personnel, as well. I didn't go inside the building, so I can't say what's in there now.
The building itself was built of stone that I am told was mined in local quarries, of which there were many in the Hudson Valley. Unlike many of the other buildings at Letchworth Village, Whitman Hall was built over a crawl space and does not have a basement.
This looks to me like it was a very solid, very beautiful building at one time. That's true for practically all the buildings at Letchworth. I find myself scratching my head trying to figure out why the town was never able to sell most of them. Time, neglect, and vandalism have since taken their toll on the structures; but when Letchworth closed in 1996, I'd think it would have been easy to find buyers.
Even now, after all those years of neglect and vandalism, this building's wall are straight and its roof doesn't sag. Take a look at the roof ridge. It looks as straight as the day it was built, 106 years before this video was taken. That's impressive.
Sadly, however, it's doubtful that Whitman Hall will ever see productive use again. In addition to the toll that time, neglect, and vandalism have taken on the building, it almost certainly contains asbestos that would have to be removed. That's expensive. So Whitman Hall stands here decaying, an attraction for urban explorers, paranormal researchers, and the occasional drone pilot.
This video was shot with an Autel EVO II Pro 6k drone, using a PNY Pro Elite Micro SD card, and edited using DaVinci Resolve Studio.
The screen shots in the gallery that follows are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license (CC BY-SA). In other words, you are free to use them pursuant to the terms of the license.
Special thanks to Idri and Mother Rita for setting me straight and correcting me with regard to the history and other facts surrounding Letchworth Village.
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