Hospitals of old Phoenix

Good Samaritan Hospital facing McDowell Road in the 1930s. Its history can be traced to Lulu Clifton, a deaconess in the Methodist Church who established Deaconess Hospital in 1911. In 1917, it was moved to remote 10th Street and McDowell and renamed Good Samaritan in 1928 (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

Deaconess Hospital in the early 1920s before it was renamed.

The east wing of Good Sam in the 1930s. The shady, grass cooled grounds of the hospital lasted into the 1970s (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

A color postcard shows the hospital in the same era.

 

A decade later, here's Good Sam (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

The Good Sam children's ward in 1944 (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

Group portrait of Good Sam nurses, 1944 (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

A block away was the Grunow Memorial Clinic before its lawn was replaced by a parking lot. This is where Winnie Ruth Judd, the "trunk murderess," worked, along with her two victims (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

The Territorial Insane Asylum in the 1890s became the Arizona State Hospital. Phoenix was offered the University of Arizona but chose this because it promised a larger number of jobs.

Booker T. Washington Memorial Hospital at 13th Street and Jefferson handled the needs of black patients in segregated Phoenix. This photo was from 1927 (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

The first St. Joseph's Hospital at Fourth Street and Polk in downtown Phoenix, circa 1890s (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

In 1911, a fire consumed St. Joe's. Note the shady campus with hedges and grass — no gravel or palo verdes (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

The second iteration of St. Joe's in the same location in the 1930s (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

A 1931 view of the exterior (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

A close view of the Polk Street side of the hospital (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

Above two photos, nuns and nurses at St. Joes, 1941 (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

By 1950, St. Joe's had outgrown its old building and purchased a large site at the city limits on the northwest corner of Third Avenue and Thomas Road. Here's the site, and below are construction photos (Brad Hall Collection).

 

Looking south across Thomas is the future north boundary of the Willo Historic District (Brad Hall Collection).

The new hospital completed in 1953 (Brad Hall Collection).

Here's the front in 1953 (Brad Hall Collection).

Phoenix Memorial Hospital at Seventh Avenue and Buckeye Road in 1960. Father Emmett McLoughlin opened a health clinic there in the 1930s that became St. Monica's Hospital then renamed Phoenix Memorial (Brad Hall Collection).

St. Luke's Hospital seen in the 1970s at 18th Street and Pierce. It opened in 1951 but traces its roots to a 12-tent tuberculosis sanatorium by the Rev. J.W. Atwood. Luke the Apostle was said to be a physician. It closed in 2019 (Brad Hall Collection).

In 1951, the Phoenix Veterans Hospital opened at Indian School and Seventh Street (Brad Hall Collection).

Doctors' Hospital at 20th Street and Thomas Road in 1970. It opened in 1961 and is today the site of Phoenix Children's Hospital (Patricia Matus Collection).

The Maricopa County Hospital in the 1970s when the building was new. For years before that, the county hospital operated out of surplus Army MASH tents at 35th Avenue and Durango Road.

County Hospital soon after its completion in 1970 (Brad Hall Collection).

The Phoenix Indian Sanitarium at 16th Street and Indian School. The modern Phoenix Indian Medical Center would be built a block north in the 1970s (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

Scottsdale Memorial Hospital, where I trained as a paramedic in the mid-1970s in the first such program in Arizona. It was originally Scottsdale Baptist Hospital. Now heavily rebuilt, this is the location of HonorHealth Scottsdale Osborn Healthcare (Scottsdale Public Library).

EPILOGUE: The "new" county hospital was built on Roosevelt east of 24th Street, far from downtown. An attempt to build a new one on the Downtown Biomedical Campus as a teaching-research facility as well as hospital was quashed by Banner Healthcare. Banner also stripped the historic name of Good Samaritan from the hospital on McDowell. It's now called Banner University Medical Center.

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My book, A Brief History of Phoenix, is available to buy or order at your local independent bookstore, or from Amazon.

Read more Phoenix history in Rogue's Phoenix 101 archive.

 

 

 

 

Comments

[Sandra Stanton Clark]

Thank you Jon. I so appreciate your offerings. My mother died at Good Samaritan in 1940, The father of my children was born at St. Josephs in 1938. My granddaughter was.born at St. Josephs in 1995. Her mother was born in Scottsdale in 1996. My mother was born in Tucson in 1905 and I was born in Morenci, AZ in 1939. Quire a collection of Arizonans! Sandra Stanton Clark

[Sandra Stanton Clark]

Thank you Jon. I so appreciate your offerings. My mother died at Good Samaritan in 1940, The father of my children was born at St. Josephs in 1938. My granddaughter was.born at St. Josephs in 1995. Her mother was born in Scottsdale in 1996. My mother was born in Tucson in 1905 and I was born in Morenci, AZ in 1939. Quire a collection of Arizonans! Sandra Stanton Clark

[Ruben]

Sandra, family involved in mining in early AZ? My grandfather born in Morenci in 1900.

Cal,

Photo of a group of nurses.
Then you show up in AZ.
Next photo, many of the nurses became nuns.

Coincidence????

[Rogue Columnist]

Thank you, Sandra. I did my paramedic training at Scottsdale Memorial Hospital. Before that it was Scottsdale Baptist Hospital. On the ambulance, I spent much time in all these hospitals, mostly in the ERs.