THE GREENE HOSPITAL By Peg Ross, Town of Greene Historian

Transcription

1 THE GREENE HOSPITAL By Peg Ross, Town of Greene Historian I was born at the Greene Hospital is a statement that is said with a measure of pride in the voice. Only someone who was born between 1942 and 1962 has this distinction with one exception. Although the maternity ward of the hospital officially closed on January 1, 1963, Dr. Erwin Centerwall agreed to extend the time for one baby due in January. Janet Barton, born January 27,1963, has the special distinction of being the last baby born in the Greene Hospital. The life of this hospital is interesting. Bessie Turner had a small nursing home at 39 North Canal Street in The building is still there as an apartment house in With the help of Drs. Charles W. Chapin and Carl D. Meacham, she turned it into a small private hospital in 1939 and it was called the Turner Hospital. It specialized in maternity and chronic cases. Before this time, Bessie had gone to homes and helped the doctors with deliveries. Helen Hunter worked with her and reminisced about helping mothers and their new babies for several days in their homes while the mothers recuperated. Helen stayed on and worked at the hospital also. In 1942, the hospital was acquired by the Hill brothers, Alvan and Linn, and became the Greene Hospital, Inc. run by the Greene Realty Company. The Hills enlarged the building and Milly Auwarter, Alvan s daughter, who was the bookkeeper from 1948 to 1962, recounted her memories of the layout, how the space was used and the fees charged. The hospital had a maternity ward on the first floor, including a waiting room, delivery room, labor room, patient rooms and a nursery. There was also a kitchen, a small eating area for the staff and an office with a day bed for the doctors. On the second floor was an operating room, an autoclave where the instruments were sterilized and patient rooms. The laundry was in the basement along with an incinerator for the disposal of medical waste. There were a total of six double rooms and four private ones that could be converted to double if necessary. Jared Alderman collaborated with Harry Rogers in the installation of a freight-type elevator on the back of the building for assistance to patients who could not manage the stairs. Mr. Alderman also constructed an examining table for the delivery room in the maternity ward. He was a master of all mechanical contrivances and did maintenance for the hospital as a volunteer. Catherine Race, R. N. who had worked at the Turner Hospital for some time, became the Superintendent of Nurses. She often slept in the attic to get some needed rest. Then Maude Mosher, R.N. succeeded her and in 1946 Mildred Cochrane, R.N. became the last superintendent. We are fortunate to have a photo of all three together. Mildred took a short leave of absence in 1955 and was replaced by Jeanette Shafer. She then came back as superintendent and worked until the hospital closed in March The charge for a stay was $16.00 a day with an additional $2.00 charged for a baby in the nursery. Along with this was a nurse s pay. Sophie Gofgosky Sawyer s paycheck for December 31, 1947 was $75 for 15

2 days work. That is $.63 an hour. $3.75 was withheld for 15 meals and Sophie remembers that the meals were delicious. She and Helen Hunter are two of the early nurses who were there in the 1940s. Special mention should be made of the five doctors involved with the hospital. Dr. Meacham, one of the founders, died in 1944 at 58 years of age. Dr. Newton Brachin came in 1925 to practice and the Drs. Everett and Erwin Centerwall, brothers who were natives of Greene, set up their practice in They, along with the aforementioned Dr. Chapin who came to Greene in 1904, used the hospital for their patients. There are wonderful, humorous and heartwarming stories about each doctor. Helen Hunter said one of them would always say to the nurses when a birth was imminent, Now don t call me until you can see the whites of their eyes. Those of you who knew these men can choose who you think said that! The local doctors arranged for surgeons from Binghamton (Dr. Pope and Dr. Griffin were mentioned) to come to perform needed surgery, with the local doctor administering the anesthetic. In most cases the local doctors from Greene or Oxford were able to perform appendectomies and tonsillectomies. The maternity ward was the heart of the hospital and all of these local doctors delivered babies. There is many a story of births. Some nights while waiting for a birth, the staff would get mighty hungry. The cook knew this and kept the desserts locked up in a cupboard. One night there was a particularly beautiful cake that was in that locked cupboard. The doctor on call (who shall be nameless) couldn t stand it any longer and said, Where is a screwdriver and pliers? He removed the door from the cupboard and enjoyed one big delicious piece of cake. One mother-to-be remembered a former nurse and the cook watching the birth from the doorway. Expectant fathers waited in the waiting room; it was a time when they didn t enter the delivery room. Horrors! One father-to-be, while waiting, ripped up a Reader s Digest into the tiniest pieces imaginable and left them in a heap on the floor. Another fatherto-be heard his wife, in a paroxysm of pain, yelling, Can t you give me something? and the doctor answering patiently, In a little while, and then gave her the baby to hold. One mother-to-be, who wanted a baby girl with all her heart, will never forget the nurse holding the baby up and saying See? You got your girl. Another new mother, happy and excited about her newborn but already busy with several young children at home, left the hospital with her husband--and forgot the baby. All these stories were told with a feeling of warmth from patients and the staff. There was a personal touch that affected everyone in a good way. This takes us up to 1950 when things began to change at the hospital. What everyone had taken for granted was no longer the case and the status quo could not be continued. The hospital was losing money. To be continued P.S. If anyone knows who the mothers and babies are in the photo, please contact me at pogr@aol.com

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