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Dunn Memorial Hospital

Location: 1600 23rd St., Bedford. (Lawrence County, Indiana)

Installed: 2005 Indiana Historical Bureau and Dunn Memorial Hospital

ID# : 47.2005.1

Text

Side one:

Lawrence County Hospital Association was organized July 15, 1903 to build, maintain, and manage a hospital in Bedford. Opened first building 1904. State, district, and local Works Progress Administration officials and city and county officials approved and turned over this building - the hospital's third - to Lawrence County, October 22, 1941.

Side two:

Open House and public tours held October 23, 1941. State WPA felt it was one of the "most beautiful building construction jobs ever completed in the state by WPA workers." Removal of patients and equipment from second building completed November 1, 1941. Addition started 1949. Major modernization and expansion of hospital was dedicated May 9, 1982.

Keywords

Science, Medicine, and Inventions, Buildings and Architecture

Annotated Text

Lawrence County Hospital Association was organized July 15, 1903 to build, maintain, and manage a hospital in Bedford.(1) Opened first building 1904. State, district, and local Works Progress Administration officials and city and county officials approved and turned over this building - the hospital's third - to Lawrence County, October 22, 1941.(2)

Open House and public tours held October 23, 1941.(3) State WPA felt it was one of the "most beautiful building construction jobs ever completed in the state by WPA workers."(4) Removal of patients and equipment from second building completed November 1, 1941.(5) Addition started 1949.(6) Major modernization and expansion of hospital was dedicated May 9, 1982.(7)

Notes:

(1)Articles of Association of the Lawrence County Hospital Association July 15, 1903. The document was recorded November 24, 1903, Lawrence County Records, Record 224 misc. November 24, 1903, Lawrence County Courthouse, Bedford, Indiana. An undocumented timeline of the history of the hospitals in Bedford was prepared as part of the eightieth anniversary celebration of the Association; "That's Dunn Caring, " p. 4 of 1984 Supplement carried in Bedford Times-Mail, Bedford Trade-Maker, and Mitchell Tribune.

(2) Bedford Daily Times, October 14 (history of first two hospitals), October 22 (final approval), October 23, 1941.

(3) Ibid., October 23, 1941.

(4)"Dunn Hospital WPA's Best Job, " undated clipping (internal information "Indianapolis, Ind. Oct. 24, " "Special to the Daily Mail"), Scrapbook, Lawrence County Museum.

(5)Clipping, dated November 3, 1941, Scrapbook, Lawrence County Museum.

(6)Indiana Limestone Company, Inc., Ilco Builders, April 1951, p. 5. Describes 1949 addition, other alterations, and a history of hospitals in Bedford.

(7) Bedford Times-Mail, May 10, 1982.