Locals know all about “The Goatman” who roams the woods of Prince George’s County, or the escaped inmates that haunt the halls of Glenn Dale.

Unfortunately for thrill-seekers, none of these rumors are true.

Glenn Dale opened in 1934, during the height of a tuberculosis epidemic that hit the capital region especially hard. Hospitals within the District were overwhelmed, so patients were shuttled to the outskirts of the city to rest and, eventually, die.

At the time, hysteria and fear dominated the country’s response to the so- called “white plague.” Sunshine and vitamin D were some of the best defenses against TB, so Glenn Dale was designed with the outdoors in mind.

The 23-building campus is situated among the rolling hills and grassy meadows of what used to be rural Maryland. There were separate buildings for children and adults, as well as for nurses and doctors. There was a solarium, laundry room, morgue, drawing rooms, outdoor gardens and indoor hothouses to grow vegetables.

Many of the buildings were designed by Nathan C. Wyeth, the same architect responsible for the Key Bridge, the original Oval Office and a number of other municipal and federal buildings in the area.

At its height, Glenn Dale housed about 600 patients and 500 doctors and staff members.

“In those days, people were afraid of tuberculosis because they didn’t know much about it,” says Kira Calm Lewis, a spokeswoman for the Prince George’s County Department of Parks and Recreation.

“Patients diagnosed with TB were cast off from society. Their families wouldn’t tell people where their relatives vanished to.”

In 2006, a Washington Post reporter shared her mother’s story about life within Glenn Dale. The young mother was 27 at the time and nine months pregnant with the author, Leah Latimer, when she experienced shortness of breath while walking up the stairs.

Despite not showing any signs of TB — fever, night sweats or coughing up blood — the doctor sentenced Etta Frances Young to treatment at the sanatorium.

“Mama sobbed in her hands and wailed about her three little girls. Just the letters ‘TB’ stunned her. Not long before, an uncle with TB had been sent to a sanatorium. Two childhood classmates, brothers, got sick with TB after they moved to the city, and died at Glenn Dale,” .

Because tuberculosis was seen as a death sentence, it bore a heavy stigma. Families shunned relatives with the disease, and treatment eluded the medical community for generations. At best, TB patients were sent somewhere comfortable to die. At worst, they were experimented on and treated with ethically questionable methods such as collapsing the infected lung.

This stigma has likely contributed to the urban legends surrounding Glenn Dale, Lewis says.

“There was a such a lack of information at the time,” she says.

Tuberculosis, or consumption as it was known, is a respiratory disease that can be highly contagious, especially among people living in close quarters. Untreated, the infection can cause bloody coughing, painful breathing and severe fever and fatigue. It is caused by bacteria lodged in the major organs, but typically affects the lungs. It can now be treated with harsh antibiotics that must be taken for up to nine months.

“There was a huge stigma surrounding TB, so they kind of isolated the patients,” Lewis says. “No one spoke about having tuberculosis.”

By the 1950s, the number of TB cases declined, and Glenn Dale slowly started to empty. In the 1960s, the campus opened up to include indigent patients. It remained a nursing home until the campus closed because of asbestos in 1982.

“Glenn Dale was never a home for the insane. It was never a prison. It was always a hospital,” Lewis says.

But it has nevertheless become a playground for teens, ghost hunters and other urban adventurers. Lewis says trespassers are frequently escorted off the grounds, especially during Halloween season.

“Teenagers dare each other to see who can get on the property,” she says.

Officials have been approached by film crews and researchers eager to hints of creepy, spooky or unearthly beings lurking inside the halls of Glenn Dale. Despite the intense supernatural interest, Prince George’s County is focusing on finding a buyer for the abandoned campus.

Glenn Dale now belongs to the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission, which purchased the hospital from the District of Columbia for $4 million in 1994. In 2011, it was added to the .

Lewis says finding the right buyer has been painstakingly slow. The county issued a request for proposals, but no developers were able to meet the criteria set aside in 1995, which requires that a majority of the property be set aside for continuing care or to serve as a retirement home.

“It’s a prime location,” Lewis says. “We want to find a developer that will make good use of this land.”

But first, the rubble must be cleared, buildings need to be stabilized and asbestos has to be removed. In 2015, the land was cleared of some trees and debris, and grass was cut back. Lewis says security cameras are also being installed on the property.

The project is so immense that Prince George’s County is still pricing the partial restoration of Glenn Dale.

Until then, the former hospital remains a ghost-hunting destination:

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One of D.C.’s most beloved venues is revamping its small eatery and replacing
dining booths with pinball machines.

The Black Cat nightclub debuted its new Lucky Cat room over the weekend. It is
packed with five machines, three video games, a claw machine and a shuffle
bowler.

The club’s Food for Thought Cafe, next to the entrance, has been downsized
to just two dining tables. Stools at the counter and along the front window
will stay in place for people chowing down, but the real attraction will be the
games.

“I’ve played pinball since I was quite young, and we have two or three more
people here that are more serious pinball junkies,” says Black Cat owner Dante
Ferrando. “It’s just a fun thing to do.”

The new machines include “Twilight Zone,” “Addams Family” and “The Wizard of
Oz.” They join the existing “Star Trek” and “Whodunnit” machines, which have
been moved from the Red Room bar.

Pinball is making a comeback of sorts, and has gained popularity in cities
around the
country such as , <a
href=”http://www.pinballnyc.com/”>New York and <a
href=”http://www.pinballchicago.org/”>Chicago. While D.C. has a relatively
small scene, Northern Virginia boats its own <a
href=”http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/with-sterling-location-pinball-
league-lights-up-northern-virginia/2013/02/07/49fc5e08-6f0f-11e2-aa58-
243de81040ba_story.html”>league.

As a lifelong pinhead, Ferrando sees the uptick in interest as part of a
natural pendulum swing. In the 1990s, for example, pinball and other games
were regularly incorporated into bars and venues, he says. That trend leveled
off in the early 2000s before enjoying the current resurgence.

“People are much more into games than they have been,” he says. “They have
games at home, on their phones. It’s more a part of the culture.”

But pinball, like pool, is a social game that can be enjoyed with friends.
Instead of burying your face into online poker or “Fruit Ninja,” you can get a
group together for beers, music and pinball, Ferrando says.

In the 20 years Black Cat has offered pinball, the machines have changed
drastically, Ferrando says. Once wooden and relatively simple, today’s games
feature LED lighting, electronic displays and bright, vivid colors.

“Games are being made now are really well thought out,” he says. “I used to be pretty good, but now I’m going to have to practice.”

Are you a pinhead? Here some are other places in the area where you can find
machines:

• 
  — Northwest D.C.

• — Northwest
  D.C.

• — Northwest D.C.
• — Sterling, VirginiaFollow and <a
  href=”https://twitter.com/²ÝÝ®´«Ã½Ent”>²ÝÝ®´«Ã½ Entertainment on Twitter and <a
  href=”https://www.facebook.com/wtopnews”>²ÝÝ®´«Ã½ on Facebook.

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Just 60 days after the , redevelopment will start on the 207,352-square-foot space. Formerly an ice rink and sporting arena, the Washington Coliseum will eventually be transformed into a mixed-use retail and office building.

The $50 million project should take about 15 months to complete, says Douglas Jemal, founder and president of , which acquired the property in 2004.

“Any building that has a name like the Uline Arena or Washington Coliseum, you know where it is,” he says.

“And the area is amazing. You just don’t recognize it from one day to the next.”

Situated in the quickly gentrifying NoMa neighborhood, the Washington Coliseum’s storied past is as diverse as the acts it once hosted.

An ice house was first constructed on the site in 1931. Additions were made later in the decade by original owner Mike Uline. In 1941, he added an ice arena that hosted the Ice Capades and professional hockey teams.

The Uline Arena, as it was called in its early years, was one of the first venues in the United States to desegregate, says Rebecca Miller, executive director of the . It did so in 1948, the same year President Harry S. Truman issued an executive order mandating the military to racially integrate.

By 1959, when the arena changed its name to the Washington Coliseum, it had already become an important setting for African-American cultural and sporting events. Both Malcolm X and Nation of Islam founder Elijah Muhammad spoke there in 1959 and 1961.

But by 1967, the Coliseum was starting a downward decline, Miller says.

Violence during a performance by The Temptations in 1967 was a harbinger of what was to come one year later during the 1968 D.C. riots. After that, concerts were banned at the Washington Coliseum until the Godfather of Go-Go played there in the 1980s, Miller says.

“It fell on hard times,” she says. “It became a roller rink, a faith center, and then a waste management company used it as a trash transfer station” until 2003, when the company applied for a demolition permit.

The D.C. Preservation League instantly stepped in to save the building, which achieved historic status in 2006.

“This is a completely documented building,” Miller says, adding that it is a perfect example of mid-century sports architecture.

The building sits along the Red Line tracks on 3rd and M streets in Northeast D.C., and its vaulted roof makes it one of the most identifiable buildings in the city.

“Once I describe it to people, they’re like ‘Oh, I’ve seen that building before,’ but they never really knew what it was used for,” Miller says.

It’s this sense of history that attracted Jemal to the property, he says.

Douglas Development – which owns high-profile real estate throughout the region, including the Shops of Wisconsin in Bethesda, Md., the Wonder Bread Factory in Northwest D.C. and the Central National Bank Building in Richmond, Va. – will keep the historical integrity of the building, but will add two floors of office space. The ground floor will be retail.

“The neighborhood is just growing, growing and growing,” Jemal says. “As I like to say, go east and find your fortune.”

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