Rare Photos Offer Glimpse Inside Metropolitan State Hospital in Norwalk

Newly resurfaced photographs taken over 18 months in 1979 offer a rare and intimate look inside the Metropolitan State Hospital in Norwalk, California, a facility providing care for individuals with mental health conditions.

Photographer Merrick Morton received a California state grant to document the hospital’s Volunteer Program, initially expecting a project lasting just weeks. However, Morton found himself returning repeatedly, gaining access to both chronic and acute wards with a passkey. “I was issued a passkey to both chronic and acute locked wards,” Morton explained. “I mainly photographed on the weekends when the admin offices were closed.” He continued his documentation for a year and a half largely unnoticed, eventually being discovered by staff who didn’t recognize him on a Sunday.

The images, recently shared on Morton’s Instagram, depict both patients and staff, capturing moments of pain, joy, and even humor within the hospital walls. One photograph shows a patient wearing a t-shirt that reads, “Are you lonely I am Y???”. Morton reflects that, “in an odd way,” the ward’s inpatients and staff became family to him during his extended stay. The photographs offer a historical record of mental healthcare practices, a field that has undergone significant evolution since the late 1970s.

The Metropolitan State Hospital, which opened in 1916, has been the subject of scrutiny in the past, including a 1975 documentary called Hurry Tomorrow that sparked controversy over the over-medication of patients. However, conditions at the hospital have reportedly improved considerably since then. Morton’s work adds to a growing archive of visual documentation of Los Angeles history; he also founded Fototeka, gaining access to the LAPD photo archives.

Hospital officials have not yet commented on the release of the photographs, but are expected to review the images as part of ongoing efforts to document the hospital’s history and evolution.