Hidden in New York City’s East River is a place that feels remarkably distant from the busy metropolis surrounding it. North Brother Island, located between the Bronx and Rikers Island, has been uninhabited since 1963, when the final institutional use of the island ended. Today, its abandoned structures are surrounded by dense vegetation, while the island itself remains inaccessible to the general public. New York City Parks records describe the island as a former home to a quarantine facility, student housing and an addiction treatment center. Over decades of abandonment, nature has steadily reclaimed what was once a functioning institutional campus.
The island’s most notorious chapter is connected to Mary Mallon, better known as “Typhoid Mary.” Mallon became one of the most famous healthy carriers associated with typhoid fever in American history and spent years isolated at Riverside Hospital on North Brother Island. She ultimately died there in 1938. The island’s quarantine history, however, extended far beyond one person. Riverside Hospital treated and isolated people affected by infectious diseases, and North Brother became part of New York’s broader public-health response during an era when cities faced recurring threats from diseases such as tuberculosis, smallpox and typhoid.
