History of Thomas H. Boyd hospital
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By Carmen Ensinger
With Thomas H. Boyd Hospital in Carrollton being a topic of discussion the past few weeks, it might be time to look back and see how the hospital came to be.
The hospital was dedicated on Sept 21, 1941. It was donated in memory of Thomas H. Boyd by his daughter, Virginia Boyd Kelsey.
The reason Carrollton and the Greene County community have the little hospital is because of a generous donation by Kelsey. Kelsey, who lived in Chicago, left to the City of Carrollton $150,000 in her will to be used to erect a hospital if the physicians of Carrollton wanted it and would agree to serve on the board.
Kelsey felt that this $150,000 could pay for a hospital which she thought would be a fitting memorial to her father, the late Judge Thomas H. Boyd, who was a prominent resident of Carrollton.
However, it turned out that some of Kelsey’s fortune had been lost in bad investments during the 1930’s crash. The $150,000 that Kelsey had left for the construction of the hospital had dwindled down to a mere $35,000 for building purposes and $25,000 for an endowment fund.
Even back then, the $35,000 available for creating the hospital didn’t go very far and at this point the people of the community entered the scene.
Residents of Carrollton and the surrounding communities reasoned that a fine building could be built for the $35,000 if the money could be devoted to the building only. The furnishing and equipping the hospital would be done through fundraising.
A corporation was formed with Dr. A.K. Baldwin as President, Dr. A.D. Wilson as Secretary-Treasurer. The Board of Trustees included Dr. S.F. March, Dr. W.F. Waggoner, Joseph Clark, Sr, Jack McDonald and Francis Vaugh. Ben W. Mehl acted as the Chairman of Finance.
These men were in charge of the construction of the building and the purchase of equipment, but they also credited the people of the community who gave of their time and money according to their means.
Sums were donated ranging from 50 cents to $1,000 and donations came from as far away as California from former residents. The late Justice Norman L. Jones donated the land upon which the hospital was built.
Once the hospital was built and furnished, Berniece Meade, former head nurse at Deaconess Hospital in Lincoln, was chosen as the Superintendent of the new 20 bed facility. She served the hospital faithfully until her resignation on Oct. 1, 1965.
During her administration, there were two new additions added to the facility. In 1950, the west wing was added and in 1958 a second wing was added for obstetrics increasing the capacity of the hospital to 50 beds.
Following the resignation of Meade, Roy Shoemaker, of Anna, became the new administrator in October of 1965. Around 1968, construction began on a new 26,000 addition. This new addition would include an extended care facility that would be known as “The Reisch Memorial Addition.”
Total cost of this new addition was around $900,000, the cost of which included the furnishings and equipment. This project was made possible by money received from the wills of the late Mardena F. Reisch and Louis Reisch estates as well as funds from a Hill Burton Grant and from local contributions.
