The former Nevada County Hospital in Nevada City is described as haunted due to its history as a mental institution, multiple deaths, and decades of abandonment. Located in the forests of California's Gold Country, the building's decaying state and eerie atmosphere add to its reputation. The facility housed the mentally ill from the 1870s to the 2000s. Sites with histories of mental health treatment are often subjects of ghost stories, with tales of suffering and tragic patient stories leading to hauntings. The hospital was the site of a fatal shooting in 2001, in which a former patient killed two employees. The building was abandoned soon after, with the event adding a recent and violent trauma to its history. In the 1980s, the hospital also housed inmates due to prison overcrowding. This adds to the sense of a troubled past involving crime and confinement. Abandoned for decades, the building is now boarded up and covered in graffiti. The state of decay and its secluded location in the woods give it a naturally creepy and foreboding feel. Visitors and urban explorers often report a deeply unsettling or creepy feeling, as if they are being watched.