“Let us dedicate this new facility to all those who in years to come will walk through its doors seeking comfort and healing: the lame and the halt and the afflicted among us. Let us be ever mindful of THEIR needs and let us be ever vigilant as we minister those needs.”
– Robert C. Rich, 1st President of the Carthage Area Hospital Foundation (1994-1997)
Our Healing Heritage
Carthage Area Hospital was established as a not-for-profit 501 (c) (3) rural community hospital in 1965.
Currently, an accredited, 25-bed Critical Access Hospital serves approximately 83,000 residents living in Jefferson, northern Lewis and southern St. Lawrence Counties. Originally, Carthage Area Hospital was a 78-bed facility until it applied for Critical Access Designation in the spring of 2014 and received the designation on July 2, 2014.
The Hospital is proud to serve our North Country neighbors, our military personnel, and their families from Fort Drum. Fort Drum and the 10th Mountain Division (Light) are one of a few military installations within the United States that does not have its own on-post military hospital. Meeting our Hospital’s mission in healthcare support and well-being, we continually assess our efforts to improve as well as expand needed services and technologies for our community. This includes the healthcare support to our dedicated Soldiers from Fort Drum and the 10th Mountain Division (Light). As patriots, we value and appreciate our military and their families and do our most to assist them in becoming an integrated part of our community; while using the services of our facility.
The Carthage Area Hospital Community Partners Primary Healthcare Network continues to improve healthcare access to residents within its primary and secondary service areas. This is accomplished through collaborating partnerships with local governments, schools, churches, civic organizations, and neighboring healthcare providers. Because of these partnerships, we are now operating thirteen clinics, four School Based Health Centers (SBHC), one Sleep Center, and one (1) Assisted Living Facility (Meadowbrook Terrace). Through these partnerships, we are established to work in unity with various communities and improve basic healthcare access for the communities we serve. Carthage Area Hospital has been instrumental in developing partnerships with various local schools to open SBHC within the respective school buildings.
Carthage Area Hospital is accredited by The Joint Commission (TJC).
Background
Some of this information was taken from the files of the Carthage Republican Tribune and the Watertown Daily Times | by Lynn Thornton, Town of Champion Historian
In the beginning, health care was an individual endeavor. Then someone stepped forward as a mid-wife and soon after a doctor settled in the hamlet. Doctors started treating people in their own homes, or visited the sick in theirs. By 1910, there were six doctors between the two villages.
In 1923, Miss Rilla McNeil opened a “rest home” in the Fred Lanphear home at 942 State Street. This was three years after an abortive effort was made by a group of citizens to build a public hospital on a site already purchased on N. Washington Street. Money was raised and work begun, water and sewer were extended to the site and the hospital was temporarily opened and used as a contagious hospital during an epidemic after which it closed. Things ground to a halt until Miss Mc Neil opened her “rest home” for what she expected to be two or three patients.
We don’t have a firm date when this hospital was closed, but found it was due to the health of Miss McNeil prior to 1934 when she was the nurse to Dr. Simmonds who retired in that year. In July, 1930, Miss Marguerite Garvin bought the 15 room house, on the corner of Vincent and Madison streets in W. Carthage, with the intent of opening a hospital. The physicians of the twin villages were very much in favor of the plan and were lending their cooperation and support in the project. The plans were for the lower floor of the hospital to have wards for men and women where eight people could be cared for. Miss Galvin reported that a small operating room was under construction, along with a kitchen and smaller diet kitchen. The obstetrical, medical and first aid surgery were planned for the second floor. Although privately owned, the hospital would be opened to the general public. An open house was held in August 26, 1930 and it was the only hospital in the village. In July of 1963, the hospital was closed for a while and in August, 1964 it closed for good at the time of Miss Garvin’s retirement.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the bridge, Mrs. Emogene Peck of Great Bend, a registered nurse with 33 years of experience announced that she would be opening a completely equipped hospital in Carthage in January, 1936. The hospital would be located at 812 State Street in the 30 room house formerly occupied by the John Strickland family. 16 beds had been installed, and more could be added as needed. The hospital would have an operation room, a delivery room, and a sterilizer room.
In February of 1948, Miss Clarisse Luther of West Carthage, announced the purchase of the Carthage Hospital at 812 State Street from Mrs. Emogene Peck who had owned and managed it for more than ten years. Among the improvements will be an elevator, sufficiently large to accommodate a stretcher or portable operating table was installed by the Otis Elevator Company.
In the summer of 1952, the hospital was purchased from Miss Luther by William Reeves after being closed for nearly a year. The building at 812 State Street Mrs. Rosalie Sligar was a registered nurse at Mercy Hospital in Watertown and then Head Nurse at the former Carthage Hospital on State Street. In 1956, she and her husband James, purchased the Carthage Hospital, which they operated until the opening of Carthage Area Hospital on West Street Road in 1965.
With the opening of the new Carthage Area hospital the Sligar converted the hospital into a nursing home and operated it until building Greenbriar Nursing Home which opened in 1969. They specialized in chronic care cases to patients. In January of 1961, the CRT interviewed local doctors and found them unanimously agreed that the Twin Villages should have a modern new hospital to replace the two proprietary hospitals occupying converted dwellings. Dr. John J. Bourke, the director if the Hospital Review Board of the State Health Department, told the people at a meeting that this community could support a 50 bed hospital.
Construction contracts totaling $694,725 were awarded in December of 1963, groundbreaking took place on April 13 of 1964, and the hospital opened its doors on July 7, 1965. In May of 1966 it was announced that the hospital had admitted 1,114 patients in the first 10 months.
April 2nd, 1975
In 1968 the hospital administration applied for approval for a projected 20 bed addition.
In 1972 the expansion program was launched and by November had reached $307,327, the State Dormitory Authority approve the sale of bonds for the addition and ground was broken in March of 1974.
In 1995, the Hospital completed a 6,000 square foot expansion / renovation of its Emergency Department (ED).
Completed in the summer of 2004, the Carthage Area Hospital held a dedication ceremony on July 29, 2004 for the newly added Professional Building at 3 Bridge Street, Carthage, New York. Services housed at the Professional Building include Behavioral Health, Dental, Orthopaedics, Urology, Physical Therapy, and Surgical services. The Hospital Foundation office is also located in the Professional Building and centrally located for community members to remain active in the Foundation’s Mission.
The next most significant overhaul of the campus was in 2007; a $9.2 million renovation that included a 24,000 square feet building expansion to accommodate a new birthing center, surgical suites, lobby and small administrative services area for medical records, data processing and general accounting suites.
On December 9, 2010, Carthage Area Hospital held another dedication ceremony for the Community Health Center located at 117 North Mechanic Street in Carthage, New York. The 6,000 square foot one story building houses the Women’s Way to Wellness Center, Pediatric Center, and a Primary Care Office. Federal and State grant funding supported the construction of these two buildings totaling slightly over $2 million. In addition to improving basic healthcare services for the surrounding communities; the expansion of healthcare services is a major economic stimulant for our downtown business district; again providing an opportunity to remain connected within the Carthage Area and serve as a business partner within our community.
The Carthage Area Hospital is fortunate to offer an assisted living facility as a service of the Carthage Area. In February of 2013, we opened Meadowbrook Terrace, a 60-bed facility that is located in a quiet, country setting and offers its residents everything cherished – a sense of independence, freedom, privacy, and peace-of-mind. Enhancing the quality of life in later years is what assisted living is all about, and Meadowbrook Terrace sets the highest of standards in providing a place to call home. Meadowbrook Terrace provides the residents with the necessary support services to enable them to maintain a healthy, independent lifestyle with a full suite of services / amenities, security, and comfort.