page_title: The Octagon (Roosevelt Island)
hierarchical_section_title: The Octagon (Roosevelt Island)
caption_attribution_description: The Octagon on Roosevelt Island. NYCLPC designation 1976.
context_page_description: The Octagon, built in 1834, is a historic octagonal building and attached apartment block complex located at 888 Main Street on Roosevelt Island in New York City. It originally served as the main entrance to the New York City Mental Health Hospital, which opened in 1841. Designed by Alexander Jackson Davis, the five-story rotunda was made of blue-gray stone that was quarried on the island. The Octagon is the last remnant of the hospital, and after many years of decay and two fires, was close to ruin. After restoration, it has now been incorporated into the adjacent buildings to create a large apartment complex.
  Mistreatment of patients at the asylum was the center of the exposé by Nellie Bly in her 1887 book Ten Days in a Mad-House.
context_section_description: The Octagon, built in 1834, is a historic octagonal building and attached apartment block complex located at 888 Main Street on Roosevelt Island in New York City. It originally served as the main entrance to the New York City Mental Health Hospital (also known as the New York City Lunatic Asylum), which opened in 1841. Designed by Alexander Jackson Davis, the five-story rotunda was made of blue-gray stone that was quarried on the island. The Octagon is the last remnant of the hospital, and after many years of decay and two fires, was close to ruin. After restoration, it has now been incorporated into the adjacent buildings to create a large apartment complex.
  Mistreatment of patients at the asylum was the center of the exposé  by Nellie Bly in her 1887 book Ten Days in a Mad-House.
caption: Aerial view
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