Arkham City (Art by Michele Botticelli)
Arkham, or Arkham City, is a desolate city set in the state of Massachusetts and where the infamous Arkham Sanitarium is located.
Description[]
The precise location of Arkham is not totally specified though form Lovecraft's notes it is presumed that it is some distance to the north of Boston, probably in Essex County, Massachusetts. Will Murray of the B.P.R.D. places Arkham in central Massachusetts and suggests that it is based on the small village of Oakham. But according to Trevor Bruttenholm, because of the dark powers that engulf the city due to centuries of dabbling with the occult, Arkham's entire setting actually warps itself whereby it "jumps" from one part to the other but "never far nor near".
Overview[]
Arkham's most notable characteristics are its gambrel roofs and the dark legends that have surrounded the city for centuries. The disappearance of children (presumably murdered in ritual sacrifices) at May Eve and other "bad doings" are accepted as a part of life for the poorer citizens of the city.
The city is home to Miskatonic University, the Arkham Historical Society and Arkham Sanitarium. It is said in that the town was devastated by a typhoid outbreak in 1905. Arkham's main newspaper is the Arkham Advertiser, which has a circulation that reaches as far as Dunwich. In the 1880s, its newspaper is called the Arkham Gazette. Arkham was also the setting where the STEM experiments were taking place particularly in the Sanitarium but due to the horrendous effects of the project it consequently enveloped the town itself in its range.