20 Mind-Blowing Facts You Never Knew About American Horror Story
15. The Asylum Is Based On Real Life
The asylum in the second season was a pretty grim place, but Briarcliff was based on a real life asylum. The story around the asylum being run abysmally and treating its patients horrendously was based around the true life events of Willowbrook State School in the Willowbrook neighbourhood of Staten Island in New York City. The school was a state supported institution for children with intellectual disabilities, and by 1965 had 6,000 inhabitants. Terrible conditions and questionable medical practices and experiments prompted Sen. Robert Kennedy to call it a snake pit. The horrors of the school were exposed in a 1972 documentary entitled Willowbrook: The Last Great Disgrace by then newbie reporter Geraldo Rivera, similar to how Lana uncovers the horrors of Briarcliff in her documentary in the TV show. In real life, public outcry led to the closure of Willowbrook in 1987 and caused a federal civil right legislation protecting people with disabilities.
