USA > New York > New York and its institutions, 1609-1871. A library of information, pertaining to the great metropolis, past and present > Part 25
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INSTITUTION FOR RELIEF OF RUPTURED AND CRIPPLED. 407
while a narrower one, running at right angle with this, divides it into equal parallelograms. This floor contains a reception- room, a spacious hall for the meetings of the managers, ap- propriate rooms for the family, and several apartments for patients. The second and third floors, which have walls eighteen feet high, are each divided into three longitudinal divisions, to be occupied by the children; the central one on each floor is a clear space where they receive their food and instruction ; the others contain their beds, clothing, etc. The fourth floor is an open expanse for convalescent patients to enjoy the sunlight, free air, and amuse themselves with suit- ably limited calisthenics. This story is eighteen feet high, covered with a large central and several smaller domes, through which the invigorating sunlight pours its mellow rays upon the pale but hopeful patients. The building con- tains an admirable system of ventilation, is heated throughout with steam, and well supplied with bath-rooms, hot and cold water. The spacious stairway is fire-proof, and the building is furnished with a fire-proof elevator, worked with steam, which carries patients' food and all other appliances from the basement to the fourth floor. The edifice has been completed at an expense of $250,000, including the site, and has ample accommodations for two hundred patients. The Institution is now prepared to receive pay patients, both children and adults, and the society has entered, we trust, upon a new era in its useful career. Its labors in the past, aside from all human and moral considerations, have been abundantly successful, relieving the city of hundreds who must have been beggars and paupers, and supplying the means of comfort and inde- pendence to many worthy families. The children are in- structed in English and German, and many who never saw a book at home make surprising progress. The Institution in its management is Protestant, though not denominational, and sound Christian morals are inculcated in the minds of its in- mates, who represent all creeds and nationalities. Without disparagement to any, we can but regard this as among the very first institutions of this great metropolis.
THE HOUSE OF REST FOR CONSUMPTIVES.
(Tremont, N. Y.)
THE idea of founding an institution for the better treatment of consumptives, we are told, originated in the mind of Miss E. A. Bogle, of White Plains. Her mother having died with consumption, she was led to reflect much upon the nature of the disease, and having spent fifteen months in a camp hospital at David's Island during the war, and taken charge of the Home for Incurables at West Farms after her return, she conceived the idea of establishing an institution where pulmonary complaints should be made a subject of special study and treatment. She communicated the idea to the Rev. T. S. Rumney, D.D., of White Plains, who entered with spirit into the movement and became the founder of the Institution. The society was organized in September, 1869, and on December 1st a House of Rest for Consumptives was opened at Tremont, with one female patient. The author visited the Institution on the last day of January, 1870, and found five patients, three male and two female. The building leased at Tremont is a very eligible one, with fine surroundings, on the line of the Harlem Rail- road, though it is the purpose of the trustees to purchase land and erect suitable buildings at White Plains at no distant day. It is designed to be a charitable institution, receiving patients afflicted with pulmonary complaints from any and every denomination, supplying all with medical treatment and nursing ; also " with the ministrations of the Gospel according to the forms and doctrines of the Protestant Episcopal Church." Any person or society may establish a free bed, to be constantly occupied by any invalid he shall designate, on the annual payment of three hundred dollars.
It is the desire of the managers to have as many of the beds free as possible. Persons become members of the society on the annual payment of ten dollars, or a life mem- ber on the payment of one hundred at one time.
. It may be doubted whether the best location has been selected, a dry atmosphere being thus far considered the most important desideratum for consumptives.
While it is too early in the history of the Institution to
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THE HOUSE OF REST FOR CONSUMPTIVES.
make any safe prediction concerning it, may we not, how- erer, rejoice in the undertaking, and hope that new light may be shed on this hitherto dark subject, and that thou- sands who would otherwise sink pale and lifeless into prema- ture graves may be spared for years of toil and usefulness.
Other diseases that successfully baffled the skill of the medical fraternity for ages have been conquered by the in- vestigations of modern times. The small-pox was the raging scourge of the world until Dr. Jenner, by long study and careful experiments, disrobed it of its power. Certainly, in a climate like ours, where three-fourths of the people are afflicted with pulmonary diseases in some of their forms, and all are liable to be, no more important subject can challenge the researches of the physician, or the charities of the benevo- lent.
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NEW YORK INFIRMARY FOR WOMEN AND CHILDREN. (No. 128 Second avenue.)
Until very recently it has been difficult, if not quite im- possible, for a woman to obtain a complete medical and sur- gical education, either in this or in any other country. That she possesses the talent, and should by instruction secure the fitness to successfully treat the delicate cases of her own sex, is to us a matter of plainest common sense; yet such has been the prejudice of the medical fraternity and of the world at large, that for ages she has been debarred from the halls of the medical college, and from the operating theater at the hospital. A growing desire to enter this wide field of usefulness has been evinced by the female sex for the last fifty years, and is becoming more and more conta- gious as opportunities in this direction are afforded. Some- thing more than twenty years ago, Misses Elizabeth and Emily Blackwell managed to press their way through a medical course, and graduated at a medical college in Cleve- land. Several years were subsequently spent in the prosecu- tion of these studies in Europe, after which they returned,
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NEW YORK INFIRMARY FOR WOMEN AND CHILDREN. 411
and with the aid of a few friends founded the first medical charity conducted by female physicians, and the first hospital in the world for the instruction of women in medicine and surgery. The Institution was incorporated in December, 1853, under the general act of 1848, with a board of eigh- teen trustees, among whom stand the names of H. Greeley, II. J. Raymond, Charles A. Dana, Elizabeth Blackwell, etc. Their first movement was to open an infirmary or dispensary in a single room near Tompkins square, with a capital of fifty dollars, to be attended three times a week by Doctor Eliza- beth Blackwell. Three years later, reinforced by the return of Doctor Emily Blackwell from Europe, and by Marie E. La Krzewska, a lady of medical attainments, a hospital de- partment was added. This last step was taken amid many fears and doubts on the part of sundry trustees and friends of the cause, lest, through the prejudice of the public, the death certificates signed by a woman should not be recog- nized by the authorities, and the means necessary to defray the expenses of the enterprise should fail. But the faith of woman discovered light ahead and pressed on. The names of several distinguished practitioners were secured as a con- sulting board, and in the fourth year the infirmary was by the State and city placed on the list receiving governmental assistance, which official recognition was considered more valuable than the financial aid secured. In 1862 a subscrip- tion was started, which resulted in the purchase of the four- story brick building, twenty-six by seventy feet, situated at No. 128 Second avenue. The building cost. $17,000, but the improvements and other changes have since doubled its mar- ket value The society in addition to about $1,000 annually received from the State, has recently received $10,000 from the city, which has enabled it to remove the mortgage on its property and to lease for a term of years the adjoining build- ing, thus greatly enlarging its accommodations. During the first five years that the infirmary was located on Second avenue, 31,657 sick persons were treated, the greater portion being out-door patients. On account of their limited accom- modations, but 640 were received into the house, 353 for the practice of midwifery, only five of whom died, an average of one per year. The small percentage of deaths establishes the capacity of woman to successfully conduct a hospital. Their business is rapidly increasing, as no less than 6,413 were treated or supplied with medicine during 1869. More
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
than one hundred have been received into the house annually for several years past, the majority being obstetrical cases, though all other patients in the general practice are treated. The poor are furnished gratuitously with medicines, and vis- ited at their homes by the physicians.
The instruction of young women for nurses, and for the practice of medicine, had been from the first a leading feature in the Institution, yet the managers desired to make satisfactory arrangement with some medical school for the graduation of their students, and thus avoid the necessity of establishing a separate college. Failing to complete such arrangements, an application to the Legislature for a college charter was made in 1865, and in due time granted. The course of study is rigid, lasting three years, and requiring the students to be present in the Institution at least eighteen months during that time. The faculty of professors and lecturers, like the board of trustees, is composed of males and females. Fifteen or twenty students taking the regular course have been in attendance since the organization of the college, besides other ladies who have simply attended lec- tures. An educational fund amounting to $100,000 has been called for, to which appeal the late Chauncey W. Rose, whose name is connected with so many benevolent undertak- ings, responded with a donation of $5,000. The fund at this time amounts to above $30,000. The annual expense of the Institution had not exceeded $7,000 up to the period of open- ing the second building, and five hundred dollars have never been received in any year from pay patients. The society performs a work of great charity among the poor, adminis- tering in times of greatest need to hundreds of widows, and to others who by desertion or deception are rendered equally forlorn, and richly deserves the unstinted support of the benevolent. All honor to this pioneer college of female physicians.
NEW YORK MEDICAL COLLEGE AND HOSPITAL FOR WOMEN.
(Corner of Twelfth street and Second avenue.)
The great and multiplied difficulties which every lady has been compelled to encounter in the study of medicine and surgery has by no means dampened the ardor of the sex for such an undertaking. In all parts of Europe, as well as in America, women are loudly knocking at the door of the college and the hospital. The University of Zurich, in Switzerland, conferred the degree on its first female medical student in 1867, and the number of Russian women applying for admission into the college of medicine at St. Petersburgh has been so numerous, that the subject was several years since brought up for discussion in the Imperial Council of Education. These applications have been numerous in England, and in some recent instances, in France, ladies have received opportunities in hospitals and colleges not hitherto granted. Ten native female physicians have recently gradu- ated in India. But no country affords such opportunities to women as America, and no city to female medical students as New York. The prevalence of liberal sentiments has of late thrown open to them the great city hospitals and dispen-
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
saries, with their admirable clinics; and colleges, encouraged by the first medical talent of the age, have been erected with every appliance for their especial culture. The infirmary established by the Blackwell sisters, and so successfully con- ducted, proved the practical capacity of woman as a medical adviser, and was an indispensable prerequisite to a successful appeal to the public for means to establish an institution for such education. This having been clearly demonstrated at that infirmary, the projectors of this Institution established first the college, leaving the practical matters of hospital and dispensary to be added at a later period. The origin of this Institution should perhaps date from April, 1863, when a series of lectures were delivered to a class of females by Mrs. Losier of this city, in her own private parlor. This lady had graduated some sixteen years previously at a well-known medical college, and in these lectures was assisted by Doctor I. M. Ward. In the autumn of the same year, rooms were rented at No. 724 Broadway. Two or three years were subsequently spent at No. 74 East Twelfth street, and in June, 1868, the present eligible building, corner of Twelfth street and Second avenue, was purchased. The society was incorporated as a medical college in 1863, and the following year the act was amended adding the term " Hospital." The trustees are all females. The main building is a fine four- story brown stone, twenty-six by eighty-one feet, and cost $43,000. A rear addition, fronting on Twelfth street, twenty- four by fifty-five feet and three stories high, has been added, containing dispensary, anatomical, lecture, and dissecting rooms .. The hospital department was not opened until September, 1869, since which about four hundred female and children patients have been received. The dispensary has also treated several thousand indigent applicants. The Homeopathic system is principally taught, with a liberal leaning to all other good practice. The course of study lasts .three years, and aims at great thoroughness, the students being required to practise in the dispensary and diagnose in the Hospital. . Great pains are taken to perfect their attain- ments in obstetrics, a field in which they are expected to find their largest practice. In order to matriculation, the appli- cant must present an approved certificate of good moral character, be eighteen years of age, have a good English education, including elementary botany and chemistry, and be under the instruction of a respectable medical practitioner.
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HAHNEMANN HOSPITAL.
A free scholarship is offered to one graduate from each chartered female college in this State. The expense of tuition does not exceed $130. Students are not boarded in the Institution. About thirty students are now in attend- ance, and nearly sixty have been graduated. After gradua- tion, one or two years are usually given to the further pursuit of their studies, before they really begin practice. Two of the graduates of this Institution are now conducting a lucra- tive practice in this city, and may be seen daily riding in their carriages to the dwellings of their patients. Others are practising in other places, and proving that the practice of medicine is at present the most remunerative calling open to a woman. The Institution received $10,000 from the State in 1869, about $7,000 having been previously received from the city. It has also received many private donations, among which we may mention one from Mrs. Losier, M.D., one of its founders, of $10,000.
HAHNEMANN HOSPITAL OF THE CITY AND STATE OF NEW YORK.
(Fourth avenue and Sixty-seventh street.)
HIS is the only homeopathic hospital in the city and State of New York, and the first in its inception in the United States. It was founded by and through the in- fluence of its medical director, Dr. F. Seeger, who ad- vanced from his own funds the first thousand dollars toward launching the enterprise. Its organization and incorporation took place early in the fall of 1869. The inaugural exercises were held in the rooms of the Union League Club, on the 15th of December, 1869, and Dr. John F. Gray presided. Addresses were made by William Cullen Bryant and George C. Barrett, the latter at that time president of the Hospital. Some choice pieces of music were sung by Miss Clara Louise Kellogg. A temporary hospital was opened in a hired build- ing, No. 307 East Fifty-fifth street, where it still continues. During 1870 forty patients, all but one charity cases, were treated. There are now many more applicants than can be
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
admitted with their limited space. Measures were early taken toward the erection of large and permanent hospital buildings. The Legislature of 1870 granted the corporation twelve city lots lying on Fourth avenue, between Sixty- seventh and Sixty-eighth streets; also the sum of $20,000 toward the erection of buildings, on condition that an equal amount be raised by private subscription. About $15,000 at this writing have been secured, and an effort is being made to secure $50,000 more from the Legislature. The new structures will consist of a fine administration building, front- ing on Fourth avenue, and of two fine pavilions extending one hundred and twenty-five feet along Sixty-seventh and Sixty-eighth streets. The entire front on Fourth avenue will be two hundred feet ten inches. The pavilions, besides high basement, will have two stories each, and a Mansard story, will accommodate one hundred and seventy-five patients, giving over 1,300 cubic feet of space to each. The buildings are expected to cost, when completed, about $200,000. All the newest developments in the science of hospital constructure have been embodied in the plan, and it is believed the Insti- tution will be a worthy representative of its kind.
In the autumn of 1868 Dr. Seeger was chiefly instrumental in founding and securing the incorporation of the North- eastern Homeopathic Medical and Surgical Dispensary, which still continues at No. 307 East Fifty-fifth street. He has been from the first its chief physician. Since its opening over forty thousand patients have been treated, over eighty- five thousand prescriptions made, and more than two thou- sand visits made gratuitously to the sick at their homes. State and city aid has been received in defraying the ex- penditures, and liberal contributions have been made by prominent gentlemen of the city. The dispensary is a sepa- rate Institution from the Hospital, though several of the offi- cers serve in both boards.
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THE STRANGERS' HOSPITAL.
(Corner Avenue D and Tenth street.)
IIE number of great and good men who industriously gather fortunes that they may thereby advance civil- ization, remove or assuage human suffering, is be- lieved to be happily upon the increase. The policy of appropriating wealth during the lifetime of the giver, under the economy and direction of his own guiding mind, is also a valuable improvement on the old legacy system. Mr. Peter Cooper, Mr. James Lenox, and Mr. Daniel Drew have furnished the wealthy of New York with some excellent ex- amples of this kind. It is also our pleasure to record another in the founding of the Strangers" Hospital. Mr. John II. Keyser, a New York merchant, and the architect of his own fortune, has been able during the last year " to realize a long- cherished desire," in the founding of an institution for the relief of the suffering. Early last summer (1870) he pur- chased the old Dry Dock Bank, at the corner of Avenue D and Tenth street, and began remodelling the structure. Tlic building stands on a plot of ground fifty by one hundred and sixty feet, having in the rear an irregular L-shaped piece of land. The structure is of brick, four stories high ; the three upper of which are divided into wards, and contain space for over one hundred and eighty beds. The first floor contains the offices, a fine reading-room, and a large chapel. The building is well ventilated ; the walls are coated with a prep- aration of india rubber, to avert the absorption of any in- fectious material. The structure is heated with steam ; Russian, Turkish, and mercurial baths are provided, and every other appliance needful in a well-ordered Hospital.
The first patient was admitted January 12th, 1871, but the formal dedication did not occur until the evening of the 7th of February. After prayer by Rev. J. S. Holme, of Trinity Baptist Church, the opening address was made by Dr. Otis, president of the medical staff of the Hospital, who, after a few preliminary remarks, indicated the object and scope of the Institution as follows : "It is not intended," said he, " for the benefit of the wealthy, who in times of sickness can com-
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
mand the comforts of a well-ordered home and the attendance of a skillful physician or surgeon. Nor yet for the beggar, who leads a life of dissolute idleness, rotating in winter and in sickness about the charitable institutions of this city. It is intended for the succor and restoration of the deserving sick poor, and in an especial manner for that sadly numerous class of people in this great city who have seen better days People to whose sufferings in poverty and sickness, education and refinement put on a keener edge; strangers-strangers to the homes of plenty and comfort in which they have been born and nurtured, and from which misfortune and disease have parted them. . Nor is it alone to the strangers within our midst that the privileges of this great charity are ex- tended. Whoso is in need of the especial aid this Institution is intended to afford-even though afar off-according to the broad rendering of its patron-is entitled to be counted a stranger, and to be taken in. Such as suffer with grave dis- ease, requiring skill and an extended experience not readily attainable in the rural districts, will be permitted to receive, equally with ' the strangers within our gates,' all the bene- fits of the Strangers' Hospital. And yet another class ! To those, either rich or poor, suddenly stricken down by acci- dent or disease, the doors of this place are open at every hour, by night as well as by day, and every comfort and assist- ance will be afforded them."
The Institution and its furniture, at the time of opening, had cost over one hundred and sixty thousand dollars, all of which was paid by the generous founder, who also proposes, by the divine blessing, to entirely support it in its operations. The Institution is to be conducted under Protestant auspices, but it is not denominational. Mr. Keyser attends the Baptist church, but is not a communicant.
THE NEW YORK OPHTHALMIC HOSPITAL.
(Corner Twenty-third street and Third avenue.)
HE New York Ophthalmic Hospital was incorporated April 21st, 1852, and was opened for the treatment of patients May 25th of the same year. It was founded chiefly by Mark Stephenson, and was first opened at No. 6 Stuyvesant square. The Institution was conducted by a corps of physicians of the Allopathic prac- tice until the year 1867, when at the instigation of certain interested parties a revolution in its management was pro- duced. At the annual election of the board of directors of that year, seventeen of the nineteen elected were inclined to the practice of Homeopathy, and they immediately appointed a board of surgeons of that school to take charge of the Hos- pital. During the four and a half years since the introduc- tion of Homeopathic practice, over five thousand patients have been treated, and the number now amounts to about fifteen hundred per annum.
The Institution has been for many years at the corner of Fourth avenue and Twenty-eighth street, in a leased building but after much exertion the managers have succeeded in raising funds, and are now erecting a fine structure of their own, situated corner Twenty-third street and Third avenue, at a cost of nearly $100,000. With the entrance of the society into this improved edifice, affording ample accommo- dations for in-door patients, will doubtless come a greatly enlarged business, allowing the public to choose between the two methods of medical treatment.
NEW YORK OPHTHALMIC AND AURAL INSTITUTE.
(No. 46 East Twelfth street.)
IIE New York Ophthalmic and Aural Institute was incorporated, under the general act of 1848, on the 28th day of August, 1869. It was founded and put in working order by the personal efforts and private means of Dr. H. Knapp, of this city, formerly professor in the University of Heidelberg. The premises at No. 46
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
East Twelfth street, where the work of the Institution is con- ducted, is his private property.
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