Rise of the Modern Hospital: An Architectural History of Health and Healing, 1870-1940

457 Pages·2017·28.6 MB·English

by  Jeanne Kisacky

RISE of the

MODERN
HOSPITAL

RISE of the

MODERN
HOSPITAL
An Architectural History
of Health and Healing,
1870–1940
JEANNE
KISACKY
UNIVERSITY of PITTSBURGH PRESS
This publication has been supported by a grant from Furthermore:
a program of the J. M. Kaplan Fund.
Published by the University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, Pa., 15260
Copyright © 2017, University of Pittsburgh Press
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America
Printed on acid-free paper
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Cataloging-in-Publication data is available from the Library of Congress
ISBN 13: 978-0-8229-4461-4
ISBN 10: 0-8229-4461-8
Jacket art: Climate Room, at the Chicago Lying-In Hospital, Chicago (Ill.),
Aug. 23, 1949, Photographer—Hedrich-Blessing, Film negative, HB-12537-B,
photo courtesy of Special Collections Research Center, University of
Chicago Library. Copyright permission granted from Chicago History
Museum.
Jacket design by Alex Wolfe
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction 3
CHAPTER 1
The Hospital Building as a Means of
Disease Prevention, 1700–1873
12
CHAPTER 2
The Transformative Potential and Conservative Reality
of Germ Theory and Antisepsis, 1874–1877
78
CHAPTER 3
The Post–Germ Theory Pavilion in the
Dawn of Asepsis, 1878–1897
105
CHAPTER 4
Hygienic Decentralization vs. Functional Centralization:
Reasons for Continuity and Change, 1898–1917
166
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 5
The Vertical Hospital as an
Attractive Factory, 1917–1929
235
CHAPTER 6
The “Meadow Monument to
Medicine and Science,” 1930–1945
296
CHAPTER 7
Postwar Hospital Design Trends
338
Notes 347
Bibliographic Essay 407
Figure Sources and Credits 427
Index 435
vi
Acknowledgments
This project has been generously supported by a Grant for Scholarly
Works in BioMedicine from the National Library of Medicine as a
branch of the National Institutes of Health (Grant G13LM 009479). With-
out this aid, which allowed me to devote full time to the project and assist-
ed in the acquisition of images for the illustrations, it would never have
reached completion. Publication support from Furthermore: A program
of the J. M. Kaplan Fund graciously facilitated the inclusion of extensive
illustrations.
The project has also benefited from the aid of numerous archives, archi-
vists, collections, and fellow hospital historians. I would like to thank, in
particular, Jim Gehrlich, Elizabeth Shepherd, Adele Lerner, and Lisa Mix
of the Medical Center Archives of NewYork–Presbyterian/Weill Cornell;
Jack Eckert at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine of Harvard
University, Boston; Arlene Shaner at the New York Academy of Medicine;
Miranda Schwartz and Marilyn Kushner at the New York Historical So-
ciety; Stephen Greenberg at the National Library of Medicine in Bethes-
da; Steve Novak of the Archives and Special Collections of the Augustus
C. Long Health Sciences Library of Columbia University; Robert Steele,
formerly archivist at the Archives Mount Sinai Medical Center, New York
City; Kaura Gale and Maria Astifidis of the Beth Israel Hospital; Karen
Brewer and Colleen Bradly Sanders at the Ehrman Medical Library, New
York University; Rob Roche, archivist at the firm of Shepley Bulfinch,
Richardson and Abbott, Boston; and Barbara Opar, Syracuse University
Fine Arts Librarian. The outlines of this work began at Cornell University
under the able guidance of Christian F. Otto, Mary N. Woods, and Stuart
R. Blumin, and I remain thankful for their generous support.
vii

RISE of the

MODERN
HOSPITAL