Originally, a carriage house and tavern servicing stage coaches stood there from 1790 until December 1826, when it was sold to Genesee County. The carriage house still stands on the property today. The tavern serviced travelers from Batavia, NY to Warsaw, NY traveling along what is now known as US Route 20. At that point, the facility took in paupers, unwed mothers, the insane, and orphans.

By the early 1950s, the facility served only as a nursing home, where it was then closed by 1972; stepping aside for a new facility in Batavia, NY.

First opened in 1827, the New York facility started as a poor house where society's dregs could be housed and purportedly receive care. Habitual drunkards, paupers, and lunatics were all welcome at the asylum, which included a farm where the able bodied would work to reduce the cost of housing. In 1928 a separate stone building was added to the facility specifically for the housing of "lunatics." The insane were housed there until 1887 when they were transferred to other facilities in the state. It closed outright in 1974. The thousands who died in the facility over its long years of operation are buried in the nearby potter's field.