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Mount McGregor Correctional Facility


Mt. McGregor Correctional Facility was a medium security prison for male inmates in the Town of Moreau, Saratoga County, New York, United States. It was served by the Wilton, New York post office and included 100 structures on over 1,000 acres. Before updating security, it was called "Camp Walkaway" due to the number of breakouts. It became a prison in 1976 and closed on July 26, 2014.

The peak, Mt. McGregor, was originally called "Palmertown Mountain", named after a local native tribe. It was renamed after Duncan McGregor, who purchased the land in a tax sale and constructed a small resort along with a restaurant for summer visitors. The Saratoga, Mount McGregor and Lake George Railroad later bought the property and opened a more sumptuous resort at the end of a rail line. When the Hotel Balmoral burned in 1897, the resort faded in popularity.

The "Sanatorium on the Mountain" at Mount McGregor was opened in 1913 by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company for the benefit of its employees suffering from tuberculosis. This sanatorium, fully staffed by doctors and a nursing staff, had a goal of restoring the health of all the company's employees. A labyrinth of underground passages still exist that were used to transport the bodies of patients who died to the church and crematorium. The sanitorium closed in 1945.

After World War II, the sanatorium served as a facility for military veterans returning to civilian life. Local stories suggest Playboy magazine founder Hugh Hefner looked into purchasing the property in the 1960s or early 1970s.

In 1960 the facility was taken over by the State of New York as a school for the developmentally disabled. At first the school was the Mount McGregor division of Rome State School and then became Wilton State School.


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