Shawnee Mission Hospital

Today on the way to church we passed Shawnee Mission Hospital. This is my version of how it came to be. It is huge. When we moved to Kansas City if you were very ill or having a baby you went to Kansas City, Kansas to Providence Hospital. Our family doctor, Dr. Lawrence Leigh, very much wanted a hospital in Johnson County. First Ray got a bill in legislature so we could vote for on. It did not pass. Then he tried a different angle. He talked to Miller Nichols of the J C Nichol's Company and there was a luncheon. I remember that Dr. Leigh had just had all his teeth removed. The other doctor, Dr. Smith, was there and Miller Nichols. Miller Nichols told them he would give them the land but he did not want it in Overland Park. The Doctors talked to the city councils of Merriam and Overland Park and they traded some land so the hospital was in Merriam. I think the Merriam land was near Shawnee Mission North High School. That is why there is more than one high school in Overland Park. Then Nichols gave them the land. We sold bricks to build it. Somewhere I have a brick, I think in what is now the maternity ward. They got the Seventh Day Adventists to agree to run it. They did not approve of meat so if you wanted your patient to have meat you had to write a prescription. The operating room was underground. During the first years, the emergency room was constantly moving. Now it is huge and the operating room is on, I think, the 7th floor or whatever the top floor is. There was a grade school on the grounds and a cemetery. They are still there but the grade school is for therapy now or a gym. I think the Seven Day Adventists still run it