The Country Doctor

Before hospitals arrived in Mankato, there were doctors here. The doctors at this time were family practitioners and generally treated all the members of the family for whatever ailed them. These early doctors made house calls through rain, snow, and hail. They were also esteemed members of the community. They delivered babies, treated illnesses, set broken bones, and fixed strained muscles. Even after the first few hospitals arrived in Mankato, the old country doctors were relied on to bring families through their sicknesses.

The First Hospital

The first hospital was built through the generosity of a Civil War veteran, Colonel John E. Tourtellotte. Col. Tourtellotte was born in Connecticut, but moved to Mankato in 1857. In 1889 Col. Tourtellotte made a gift of $8,800 to the city of Mankato to establish a hospital for the "care of the sick poor". The hospital was constructed outside of the city limits and had no running water or sewage system. Water had to be pumped to a tank on the roof which leaked frequently. It was two stories tall and contained twenty rooms.

During this time, a hospital was not somewhere anyone wanted to go to. No one wanted to live near one, and fewer still wanted to be a patient in one. Hospitals were a place of last resort, usually reserved for a small pox patient or other desperate individuals. This caused the new hospital to be a serious drain on the city's treasury for the first years of its operation.

Finally, in April of 1897, four Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother were asked to take over the management of the hospital by the hospital trustees. Although the hospital still had no running water or sewage system, the Sisters had quite a bit of success and the hospital began to prosper. The hospital could accommodate only 20 patients at a time. This was inadequate for a city of 10,000.

In 1898, the Sisters purchased the John A. Willard house on Sixth Street and opened it as St. Joseph's Hospital on July 1, 1898. The Willard House accommodated 22 patients, but was soon filled to capacity. So in the fall of 1898, the foundation was laid for a new hospital on the corner of Fifth and Washington Streets. The building was complete in 1899. The Sisters continued to run the Tourtellotte Hospital for another five years before the site was abandoned and returned to Tourtellotte's heirs, who sold it to the German Lutheran Hospital Association. Two years later, the building was torn down and its stones were used in the construction of the Immanuel Hospital, built in 1906 by the German Lutheran Hospital Association.

Medical Societies

The Blue Earth County Medical Society was founded informally around 1880. Meetings were held irregularly through 1910. The minutes of these meeting were probably stored in one of the members attics and eventually discarded so we will never know for certain what went on at these meetings.

Another medical society, The Minnesota Valley Medical Association was also organized in 1880 and held meetings twice a year. During these meetings, members would report cases which had occurred in their practice. A discussion was then held and a quizzing by other members. The society was the first district medical society in the state.

The third society operating in the Mankato area was the Southern Minnesota Medical Association, which was organized in 1892. Its purpose was "the betterment of the profession and the people which is the prime incentive for its existence." The organization was for the social and scientific advancement of its members.

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Source:
Engstrom, Ruth Ann. A History of Medicine in Blue Earth County, Minnesota: 1900-1970.

Schrader, Julie Hiller. The Heritage of Blue Earth County Minnesota. Curtis Media Corporation. 1990.