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March 27, 1897
A Catholic Hospital. To be Opened in This City Shortly
The Mountain House at Laurel Run will Be Used Temporarily
Sisters of Mercy in Charge
To be Non-Sectarian in Character
A meeting of clergymen and physicians was held at St. Conrad's Hall on Thursday evening for the purpose of establishing a new hospital under Catholic auspices and the movement met with such encouragement that a temporary hospital will be opened in charge of the Sisters of Mercy early in May.
Twenty Catholic priests and twenty-four physicians from all over the country were present at the meeting and committees were appointed to carry on the arrangements for opening the institution. The hospital will be a county affair and each of the Catholic parishes will contribute to its maintenance. It will, however , be non-sectarian as to patients treated.
The new infirmary will in no way antagonize the present City hospital and the clergymen utter no word of complaint against the management of that institution but recognizing the large number of patients of the Catholic faith at the City hospital whose spiritual welfare is always looked upon as of much importance as bodily ills the clergymen felt it a duty to plan for a new hospital. While the spiritual welfare of the patient being their primal consideration, all patients will be received and treated alike regardless of creed or nationality.
At the meeting offers were received from the Franciscan Sisters of Philadelphia and another order in New York City who wished to come here and build a catholic hospital. The Sisters of the Mallinckrodt convent on the Heights would take up the work and erect a hospital adjoining their convent but a cablegram was received on Thursday from the mother house in Germany that the Sisters should take no responsibility in the erection of a new hospital as it might detract from the importance of the convent as an educational institution.
The Sisters of Mercy at St. Mary's convent this city also volunteered to take up the work and Rev. R. A. McAndrew, pastor of St. Mary's church offered the Mountain House at Laurel Run for a temporary hospital until a new building is erected. Father McAndrew's offer was accepted and the building is to be opened for patients May 1st. The order of the Sisters of Mercy is a nursing as well as a teaching order. They conduct the Mercy hospital in Pittsburg, one of the finest institutions of its kind in the State.
Sisters from the Pittsburg hospital who are trained nurses will come here and have charge of the patients. a staff of prominent resident and consulting physicians will attend to patients and it is the intention to make the hospital one of the foremost in the State. The Mountain House which has been used by the Sisters as a convent and summer home is pleasantly located on the mountain side between Georgetown and Laurel Run and but a short distance from the Prospect Rock station on the Central Railroad. It is well furnished, contains thirty beds and only a few changes to provide operating rooms, etc., are necessary to prepare it for the reception of patients.
The committee who have the matter in hand again met yesterday at Father Nagle's residence and made further arrangements toward the establishment of the institution. They also discussed several sites in the city upon which to build but no definite action was taken in the matter. The board of trustees will be non-sectarian and members of all denominations will be included. A gentlemen in the city has volunteered to contribute an ambulance and it will be housed in this city free of expense and subject to every call. The committee will meet again on Thursday evening. (Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
April 12, 1897
The New Hospital
The Gilchrist Property on Hanover Street Will Probably be Purchased
It was learned on good authority today that it has been decided to purchase the Gilchrist property on Hanover street for the new Mercy Hospital. The mother superior of the order in this city, who has been in the large cities inspecting the latest hospital improvements, is expected home this afternoon when the purchase will be made. The price is said to be $19,000.
The location is an excellent one on the corner of Hanover and Church street. The building is a large, new structure, having thirty rooms and, with but slight alterations can be made to accommodate fifty patients. The lot is 110 feet on Hanover street, 170 feet on Church street, and 170 feet adjoining the Horton estate. The Carey avenue trolley car passes the door. (Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
April 13, 1897
Arranging for New Hospital
The mother superior of the Convent of Mercy, this city, returned this afternoon from an extended trip to the large cities where the various hospitals were examined preparatory to the opening of the new Mercy Hospital in this city. The mother superior will leave again tomorrow on another tour of inspection during which final arrangements will be made for the opening of the new hospital. (Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
April 19, 1897
New Mercy Hospital
Arrangements Complete and Building Purchased
Work of Remodeling of the Gilchrist Homestead to Begin Next week
Trained Nurses from Pittsburg Hospital
The mother superior of the order of Sisters of Mercy granted the Times reporter an interview at St. Mary's Convent this afternoon in relation to the new Catholic Hospital which will be shortly opened in this city. The mother superior has just returned from an extended trip to the large cities where she visited the various hospitals with a view of securing the latest and best methods of hospital management and treatment.
The new hospital will be situated on Hanover street, the Gilchrist mansion and grounds having been purchased, and the work of remodeling the building will begin next week. The building has at present thirty two rooms and can be arranged so as to accommodate fifty patients. This location is an admirable one, being the choice of the committee of physicians, is in a nice neighborhood, easy of access. The Carey avenue car passes this building.
The Mother Superior says she secured trained nurses from Mercy Hospital Pittsburg, who will come here about June 10th and take charge of the nursing of patients. Several sisters of the convent of Mercy of this city will go to Pittsburg shortly and remain there at that hospital studying its system until the new hospital is opened, which will be on June 15th.
All the preliminary arrangements are now completed and the Mother Superior asked the Times to announce that donations to the new hospital would be thankfully received at the convent on South Washington street. The new hospital will be a worthy addition to our charitable institution and should receive the liberal support of our citizens. It will be non-sectarian so as to patients treated and will relieve the present hospital which is at times overcrowded. The projectors of the new hospital say there is plenty of room for another hospital in this city and the good Sisters should be given substantial encouragement in their worthy undertaking. (Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
October 19, 1897
The Mercy Hospital
A Circular Letter to be Sent Each Catholic Society Asking for Aid
A circular letter, a copy of which is printed below, has been prepared by the Sisters of Mercy having in charge the new Mercy hospital and will be sent to each Catholic society in this city and vicinity. All facts appertaining to the project are embodied in this letter.
Mr. President and Gentleman: As you are all probably aware, a Catholic hospital has been started in our midst, under the charge of the Sisters of Mercy of Wilkes-Barre. a large plot of ground, with a new modern thirty-room building has been purchased on Hanover street, Wilkes-Barre, at a cost of $19,000. In the rear of the building a brick addition is being erected which contains four large wards, each with a capacity of fourteen beds making fifty-six beds in the general wards in addition to sleeping apartments in the attic for the nurses. The old building, which was built only three years ago, will be used for private patients and for the executive department of the hospital.
We will have fourteen rooms for private patients, making a total accommodation of seventy patients. The brick addition will cost $13,000 making a total of $32,000 for the grounds and hospital complete. Five thousand dollars have already been subscribed. We will also have an up to date operating room. We will have a modern hospital of seventy beds with all the necessary conveniences - the equal in every particular of any hospital of its size in the country. Recognized hospital authorities claim that a hospital at a cost of $500 for each bed it contains, is as cheap as a hospital can be built. According to this estimate our hospital (containing seventy beds) should cost $35,000, but, as above stated, it will cost only $32,000 - $3,000 less than what the authorities regard as a cheap hospital.
The location of our hospital is recognized by the entire medical profession of Wilkes-Barre as to the finest and wisest in the city. There is less sickness in that section than in any other part of town. It is well sewered, the sanitary conditions are the best and the surroundings most pleasant. Then there is asphalt all the was from the Public Square to the hospital. This is a great advantage when an injured man is being conveyed in an ambulance or other vehicle. The hospital can be reached from any part of the valley by electric cars the latter passing the doors of the institution. Then again it being a county hospital it is convenient to Plymouth, Nanticoke and the lower end of the valley and as vast beds of untouched coal between Wilkes-Barre and Nanticoke are just being opened up that is the direction in which the city must grow and that is the region from which most of the mine accidents of the near future will come. Another advantage of the location is that our hospital is in the opposite end of the town to the Wilkes-Barre City hospital.
Two thirds of the patients of the Wilkes-Barre City hospital are Catholics. Half the support of the Wilkes-Barre City hospital comes from protestants, two thirds of these patients being Catholics, and not one dollar contributed by a Catholic. Is it right that we allow Protestants to support our sick? Would we allow Protestants to support our poor, our orphans or our churches? We certainly would not. Then why should we allow them to care for our unfortunate sick? Then again, how many a Catholic who has fallen away from his faith is brought back to the church while a patient in a hospital in charge of the gentle sisters. They are too numerous to mention. We should also like to remind you of the number of Catholics who die in Protestant hospitals without the consolation of the last rites of the church. This is not due to the bigotry of those in charge but frequently because the attendants being Protestant are apt to forget or overlook the importance which Catholics attach to the presence of he priest at the death bed. These attendants may, of course, send for a priest, if the patient asks for one, but many and many of times the patient, not realizing the near approach of death does not ask for a priest and dies impenitent and without the sacraments. This we know to be a very frequent occurrence and as you can really see, would be impossible in a Catholic hospital, where the good sisters are ever on watch for the spiritual as well as the temporal welfare of the patients. Our new hospital will be in charge of four sisters from the Mercy hospital of Pittsburg. These sisters are moderned trained nurses and will remain with us until our own sisters are trained to the profession.
Our hospital, remember, is to be a county institution. It will not be a burden upon the community as it will within a few years be self-supporting. We need money. We need it now, as payments are already falling due. One dollar given now will do more good than ten dollars given a year hence. We appeal to you in the name of God, of our religion and of charity, and to what greater charity can you contribute? Many a man within hearing of this appeal will one day thank God that there is a Catholic hospital to which he can go to regain his health under the loving care of self-sacrificing sisters or meet his death surrounded by his priest, the good sisters and all the consolations of his religion. Do not, we beg of you, turn a deaf ear to this appeal, and remember that for every dollar contributed now to this noblest of all charities it will be returned to you a hundred fold in the world to come. We feel sure that you will come to our aid. Give us what you can and as soon as possible for we are in pressing need of money. Every Catholic society to which we have appealed has contributed generously and we trust and feel that your organization will not prove an exception. If each Catholic society in the county will give all it can afford, it will be in addition to the money on hand and for the money we expect to raise from other sources be sufficient to enable us within a short time to open our hospital for the admission of patients.
P.S. - All money and checks should be sent to Mother Francesco, Convent of Mercy, Wilkes-Barre. All checks should be made to the order of the Sisters of Mercy. (Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
May 29, 1897
Deed
(Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
June 15, 1897
For the New Hospital's Benefit
(Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
Decwember 6, 1897
New Mercy Hospital. It is Now Completed and Will be Opened next Wednesday
(Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
March 5, 1898
The New Hospital. Will be Opened for Patients next Week
(Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
April 14, 1906
New Building for Mercy Hospital
(Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
April 4, 1906
New Building for Mercy Hospital Plans Provide for Complete New Buildings Also a Nurses'
(Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
July 10, 1907
Mercy Hospital Addition. Directors Decide to Erect a New Wing Three Stories High to Present Building
(Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
(Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
(Wilkes-Barre Times - Newspaper Article)
