The Western State Hospital, in Hopkinsville, Kentucky which started being built in 1848 and opened receiving its first patients in 1854 as the Western Kentucky Lunatic Asylum, is an inpatient center for the treatment of mental illness. It is on the National Register of Historic Places. It had a patient population as high as 2,200 by 1950. Improved medications for treatment of mental disorders allowed de-institutionalization and a decrease in inpatient numbers. The inpatient population as of 2004 was 220, from 34 counties in Western Kentucky. Its three facilities employed 650 workers in 2004.Many stories of paranormal activity have been recorded and are to be related in the upcoming book Hauntings of the Western Lunatic Asylum by author Steve E. Asher.