On December 26, 1884, millionaire Cornelius Aultman died suddenly. His widow Katherine Barron Reybold Aultman wanted to create Stark County’s first hospital in memory of her late husband, as it was an unfilled aspiration of his.
From left to right: Cornelius Aultman, Katherine Barron Reybold Aultman, and Elizabeth Harter.
She proposed the idea to his daughter, Elizabeth Aultman Harter. Elizabeth agreed to help her step-mother fulfill this plan in honor of her father. In 1891, the two women provided funding and 4.5 acres of land for the medical center.
Once it was complete, the hospital could accommodate up to 70 patients, larger than any other hospital in a city of Canton’s size at this time. Sitting at its current location of 2600 6th Street Southwest, the Aultman Memorial Hospital opened on January 17, 1892. However, the hospital did not receive its first patient until February 5 of that year. Aultman Hospital is still serving Stark County to this day. According to their most recent annual report available, the hospital cared for over 650,000 patients in 2018 alone.
Mark Holland, Archivist of the McKinley Presidential Library & Museum, helps to express as a museum our support to the people in the medical world who are fighting CoVid 19, and treating the patients as well as the disease. We want to show you the origins of our local medical institutions and personnel. Today we present to you the history of Aultman Hospital.
Mark Holland, Archivist of the McKinley Presidential Library & Museum, helps to express as a museum our support to the people in the medical world who are fighting CoVid 19, and treating the patients as well as the disease. We want to show you the origins of our local medical institutions and personnel. Today we present to you Part I on Aultman Hospital.
Mark Holland, Archivist of the McKinley Presidential Library & Museum, helps to express as a museum our support to the people in the medical world who are fighting COVID-19, and treating the patients as well as the disease. We want to show you the origins of our local medical institutions and personnel. Today we present to you Part II on Aultman Hospital.
Mark Holland, Archivist of the McKinley Presidential Library & Museum, helps to express our support to the people in the medical world who are fighting COVID-19, and treating the patients as well as the disease. We want you to know the origins and the contributions of our local medical personnel.
Today we present to you: Part I of a series on The History of Aultman Hospital
Aultman Hospital from Greentown to – Dartmouth Avenue
Recently the library received a request from a member of the Deuble family who wanted to know about some of her relatives, specifically Martin Deuble. She wanted a picture of Martin to complete a Deuble Family Genealogy that she is writing. The Deuble family was synonymous with high quality jewelry, watches, dishes, and glassware. Deuble Jewelers is one of Canton’s oldest merchants beginning in the 1830’s. The requester also wanted to find a picture of Norman Deuble, Martin’s son. It seems Norman was an active High Wheeler as far back as 1886 and an early member of the Canton Bicycle Club. Norman was participating in a bicycle race in 1892 when he got in an accident. He fell off his bicycle, and was rushed to the newly built Aultman Hospital with a brain injury. This is what is believed to be the first operation ever performed by hospital physicians at Aultman. Unfortunately, Norman did not survive. The requester knew of a studio photograph portraying the Canton Bicycle Club that included Norman. in 1886, at the age of twenty-one. Our archives have a newspaper quality image that fits this description. Enter the phrase that we use in the library every day: “If it is meant to be it will find its way to you.
Our current intern, from Walsh University, Alyssandra Howe is researching the time in Canton’s history known as “Little Chicago.” One of the major sources for her project is a master’s thesis from a student at Ohio State University who authored Saxton Street: The Reconstruction of a Red Light District. In the course of her study she read about the 1937 bullet proof Studebaker the Canton Police Department commissioned, which now lives at the Canton Classic Car Museum. Volunteer, Tom Haas, and I took Alyssandra to meet Char Lautzenheiser, the director of the museum. Char gave Alyssandra a lot of rich history of “Little Chicago”, as well as a tour of the museum including the 1937 bullet proof Studebaker.
While Char and Alyssandra were playing around the cars, the photographs hanging on the wall drew my interest. What did I find hanging on the wall in the shadow of the bullet proof car? The very photograph of the Canton Bicycle Club in 1886 with Norman Deuble and other Canton “Movers & Shakers”.
Miss Ida Saxton of Canton, Ohio would go on to be Mrs. William McKinley and eventually First Lady when her husband William took the oath of office of the President of the United States in 1897. Ida’s sister Miss Mary Saxton known as Pina (Peen Ya) would later marry Marshall C. Barber of Canton and serve on the Board of Directors of the George D. Harter Bank and Aultman Hospital both in Canton, Ohio.
Ida and Mary Saxton
Ida & Mary’s parents James & Katherine (Dewalt) Saxton had the means to give their children a well-rounded education. They sent their two daughters to Brooke Hall Female Seminary in Media, Pennsylvania.
James and Katherine (Dewalt) Saxton
Photographer W. L. Germon of nearby Philadelphia took an early photograph of Brooke Hall that found its way into our McKinley Archives.
Brooke Hall Female Seminary
W. L. Germon worked in Philadelphia at 914 Arch Street, in what is present day Chinatown. The building was razed and the area is now a parking lot.
Courtesy of Google Maps
Brooke Hall was located on Lemon Street near Baltimore Street in Media, Pennsylvania.
Courtesy of Media Historic Archives
William Jennings Bryan who ran for president against William McKinley in both 1896 and 1900.
With help from the generous team of the Media Historic Archives Commission my wife Alyson and I were able to learn more about the “finishing school” Ida and Mary Saxton attended in the mid nineteenth century. We started at the Upper Providence Library in Media where the Media Historic Archives are housed. We met with Kathy a commissioner of the historical group. She allowed us to explore books, archival photographs, and papers on Brooke Hall. The commission’s archivist, Adam generously took the time to pull all the items connected with the school. Walt, another commissioner in the group took us on a two and a half hour tour of the Borough of Media. Our first stop was an area where a house once stood that was associated with William Jennings Bryan who ran for president against William McKinley in both 1896 and 1900. Another place in town that is connected to Mr. Bryan is the Delaware County Courthouse where he gave a speech on the steps.
Using both the 1882 and the 1892 atlases of Delaware County, PA we were able to locate the footprint of Brooke Hall.
Courtesy of Media Historic Archives
Courtesy of Media Historic Archives
It was an exhilarating experience to visit another place where Ida and Mary Saxton once walked and lived for a time in their young lives.
Brooke Hall Footprint on Lemon Street
The Media Elementary School became the first anchor in the revitalization of the downtown area.
Students of Brooke Hall were not permitted to write letters to boys or visit Media without an escort. Shortlidge Academy for Boys also operated in town at the same time as Brooke Hall. Walt, our tour guide told us the all too familiar story of the suburbanization of Media, and the decay of the borough in the mid-20th century. The beginnings of the rebirth of the downtown area rested in the land where the poorhouse once stood. The same area then became the Shortlidge Boy’s Academy, and finally one of the borough’s elementary schools. The Media Elementary School became the first anchor in the revitalization of the downtown area.
Media Elementary School
Other anchors were established and eventually Media came back to be a healthy thriving borough.
Alumni from Massillon, Ohio
Ida & Mary Saxton kept fond memories of Brooke Hall, and their Principal Miss M. I. Eastman. Ida would became Brooke Hall’s most famous graduate, graduating in 1863. Over thirty years later Mrs. McKinley was still on affectionate terms with one of her teachers Miss Harriet Gault. In 1898, First Lady Mrs. Ida (Saxton) McKinley would host a banquet for Brooke Hall Alumni in the White House. The party included Teacher Miss Harriet Gault. The guest list also included; Caroline McCullough Everhard, Flora Russell McClymonds, Annie Steese Baldwin, and Carrie Jacobs Brown all of Massillon, Ohio.
Caroline McCullough Everhard Courtesy of Massillon Museum
Flora Russell McClymonds Courtesy of Massillon Museum
Annie Steese Baldwin Courtesy of Massillon Museum
Carrie Jacobs Brown Courtesy of Massillon Museum
The Massillon Museum has a fan in their collection. It is signed by these ladies from Massillon. We have reason to believe this may be a fan from Brooke Hall.
Courtesy of Massillon Museum
Brooke Hall in Media, Pennsylvania was a very special place to many young women…
The photographs in this presentation were provided by the Historic Archives Commission in Media Pennsylvania, Massillon Museum in Massillon, Ohio, and the McKinley Presidential Library & Museum in Canton, Ohio.
Archivist's Attic... 