HAMILTON HOSPITALS

About 1924/1925

With Nurses/Student Nurses on the Balconies

From a Postcard shared by Burt and Charlene (Livingston) Rose

The first hospital in Hamilton was opened in 1921 in the East Main Street former home of Dr. C. C. McMordie by Dr. C. E. Chandler and Dr. D. B. Beach after they moved their medical practice from Shive.  Drs. Beach and Chandler were soon joined by Dr. C. C. Cleveland, who had been practicing at Pottsville.  The three young doctors decided to build a 4-story hospital across the street of Dr. McMordie's home.  The new 50-bed hospital opened in 1924.  (I was born in this hospital.-Elreeta W.]  The three lower floors were constructed with brick, and the fourth floor (dormitory for nurses) was of frame construction.  Internal ramps, as well as stairs, connected the floors.  An accredited school of nursing provided training for many young ladies.  

Following the death of Dr. Beach in 1936 and Dr. Chandler in 1940, the hospital was closed for a few years.  The building was used as a barracks during World War II for student pilots who were training at the Hamilton Airfield.  Following World War II the building was again used as a hospital for a few years.

A group of Hamilton citizens met 23 January, 1957, to formulate plans to construct a new hospital.  A stock company was formed with a capitol stock of $150,000.  Officials of the stock company were: George B. Golightly, Chairman; W. P. Lawson, Vice President; and W. G. Barkley, Secretary-Treasurer.    Dr. C. C. Cleveland, C. M. Hatch, Haskell Harelik, Floyd Campbell, and W. O. Manning were also on the Board of Directors.  Haskell Harelik had  purchased the East Ward School Campus following the closure of that school and the opening of Ann Whitney Elementary School in 1949.  This property was chosen to be the location of the new hospital.  Mr. Harelik accepted stock in the Hospital Stock Company equivalent to his cost in purchasing the property from Hamilton ISD.  Hamilton General Hospital opened 31 August, 1958.

  In July, 1966, Medicare was available to the residents of Hamilton County. Congressman Omar Burleson estimated that 1,700 Hamilton County residents who were 65 or older were eligible for Medicare. Medicare was part of Lyndon Baines Johnsons’s "The Great Society" The first person to be admitted to the Hamilton County General Hospital as a Medicare patient was eighty-one-year-old Mrs. Charlie Etta (Riley) Henderson, daughter of Lorenzo D. Riley and Nancy Perkins Riley.

In 1987 Hamilton General Hospital was closed by Harris Methodist Affiliated Hospital System.  Residents of Hamilton and Hamilton County raised in excess of $320,000 to re-open the hospital in September, 1988.