Removal of Patients

From Old Hospital to the New Occurs Today

Plan to Interest Laboring Men in the Institution

S. C. Roney Presents a Scheme Which He Thinks Is Better than Sick Benefit Insurance

Journal and Tribune, April 17, 1902, Page 5

Weather permitting the eighteen patients of the old hospital will be removed from their present quarters to the magnificent new structure today about two o’clock. The patrol wagon will be used and one or two at a time will be carried slowly on stretchers therein to the new building. None of the cases are so serious that the removal will do any serious harm.

The hospital will be prepared to receive them after twelve o’clock. It will be like being transferred from hovel to palace. Such accommodations as will be found in the new building will be more than some of them have ever seen before. They are all charity patients. None other would of course find their way into the structure which is being abandoned.

At a meeting of the executive committee of the hospital board held Tuesday a schedule rate of $1.00 per day was made for private patients. This will meet the actual expenses incurred. For those who desire the best accommodations, elegant rooms, and extra service, the charges will be from $10 to $15 per week.

Sam C. Roney, chairman of the governing board of the hospital, has suggested a scheme which if carried to a successful issue will give the hospital the desired funds for making it a leading hospital of the country. The plan is carried out in many cities, and in effect is that mechanics and laboring men lay aside each year the wages of one day to go to the hospital. This would give any such persons who desire to enter the hospital free treatment and the best accommodations. He claims that it is better than the hospital would get by such means from the laboring men of the city about $15,000 per year, which sum would maintain the hospital and make it one of the best in the country.

The suggestion is one that should meet favor as it is probably the most practical way of getting the required sum. Mr. Roney suggests that the different labor organizations of the city take the matter under consideration and take steps in this direction.