Until the blizzard of 2011, a three-story, brick “mansion” that sat vacant for two decades attracted curiosity-seekers and rumors of ghostly noises began to circulate, though there is no truth to any of the tales. It is said that by walking slowly up the front entrance, one can hear the insane Dr. Swingle and his staff talking. A walk around to the back of the building results in the audible range of screaming patients supposedly buried in the back yard. (Most Haunted The hospital opened to the public with three doctors on staff. According to property data records in the Jonesborough courthouse, it opened as The Clinic Hospital, Inc. on 02/25/1948. It was the brainchild of three doctors: Hugh F. Swingle, Jr., Edward Thruston Brading and Carroll Hardy Long.A tenuous connection between Swingle and Hardy’s father was all it took to solidify the myths surrounding the building. Hardy’s was raised in Johnson City under his father’s shadow. His father was also a doctor and, rumor had it, a sloppy surgeon. When Hardy’s father arrived in Washington County in 1936, his first patient died during an operation. An anonymous post on a website titled "Haunt in Swingle Hospital” explains further: [One] of the first failed surgeries that got the whole thing started was in 1936. A young African American man died after they tried to repair his intestines. They had to use chloroform for anesthesia and a dining room table as an operating table. It was Swingle’s friends went on to bigger and better careers, leaving Swingle as the only doctor at the hospital. It closed in the 1960s and until it was demolished on 06/17/2010, it had the undue reputation for being one of the most horrifically haunted places in Tennessee.
