Kansas Sanitarium by L. C. CHRISTOFFERSON

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Jul 13, 1905

Kansas Sanitarium

By L. C. CHRISTOFFERSON

The starting of a progressive work, resulting in the erection and completion of the Kansas Sanitarium, which was dedicated and declared open to its many friends June 14, was made a little more than three years ago, when Mrs. Christofferson and I came to Wichita by recommendation of the Nebraska Sanitarium. We at once secured good rooms in a prominent five-story business block, and during our four months' stay in this place we were actively engaged in treating the sick in their homes, making use of health literature and health foods, by means of which we readily obtained work, and gained access to many of the influential homes of the city. About this time the chamber of commerce manifested their desire to secure a sanitarium in this place, which must be admitted to be a central location for the great Southwest. They invited Dr. J. H. Kellogg to come here, and he addressed an attentive audience in the First Presbyterian church of the city. The daily papers often presented the possibility of a health institution here, and we received many inquiries in regard to healthful living, and the nature of our work. The work steadily grew until we were employing several nurses to meet demands. During the summer of 1902 Elder C. McReynolds, president of the conference, often visited us, saw our needs, and heard the demands of citizens of Wichita for treatment rooms and a place where hygienic food might be served. At this time the Kansas Conference undertook the responsibility of promoting the work, and soon raised a few hundred dollars to equip a small place in which we might be able to meet the most urgent demands of our patrons. Our city friends added to this amount about four hundred dollars. A location was carefully sought, and one was found near the business center of the city, where a food store and health-food restaurant were operated on the first floor, and a physician's office, bath-rooms, and living-rooms were equipped on the second floor. September 16 of the same year, we served an opening dinner to a large number of the influential citizens of the city, and shortly afterward we were obliged to secure additional rooms for patients, who came from the various parts of the State. At this time we were grateful for occasional visits from Dr. W. A. George, of the Nebraska Sanitarium.

The organization of the Kansas Medical Missionary and Benevolent Association was effected March 19, 1903, in the Seventh-day Adventist church. The Kansas Conference Committee, Drs. S. P. S. and Maria Edwards, Dr. Lydia E. Parmele, and a corps of nurses met with the company of believers here, and after careful deliberation, unanimously voted to form a corporation.

In June, 1903, we secured the valuable services of Dr. G. A. Droll. Since the fall of that year we have conducted a nurses' training-school, the present two classes numbering thirteen. We have been blessed with a good class of intelligent and devoted young people, who have taken hold of the work in a very earnest way.

The interest in health principles on the part of several prominent men of influence, who have formed an acquaintance with our health institutions, either through their friends or through relatives, or have been patrons themselves, became very enthusiastic, and they were determined that Wichita "must secure an institution which will be the means of educating the people in right lines of living, for I know," said one of them, "that this institution will not only be a blessing to the city of Wichita, but to the whole State." Thus they set to work to do something substantial in behalf of the sanitarium work, and this found expression in a meeting with the chamber of commerce the eighth of June, 1904, when they agreed to furnish ten thousand dollars to the Kansas Medical Missionary and Benevolent Association. On this same date they turned over to the Association a warranty deed for twenty acres of fine soil, lying two and one-half miles west of the heart of the city, just outside the corporation. A little later they furnished us eighteen hundred dollars in cash. The Kansas Conference by this time had ten thousand dollars in cash and good pledges, and with this, operations were actively begun.

On the twenty-ninth of August the new building was under roof, and the corner-stone was laid. Very appropriate services were participated in by prominent statesmen and citizens, as well as by executive men of the Central Union and State Conferences. As this gathering was during the State camp-meeting here, almost the entire camp of fully a thousand people was present; these, in addition to our city friends, made the attendance large. Many interesting remarks were made by the speakers, recorded in the Wichita daily papers, showing a hearty welcome and support to both our work and workers.

Mr. J. M. Knapp, chairman of the sanitarium committee of the chamber of commerce said, in part: 'Three years ago about this time I was in Manitou, Colo., and a member of my family was with me, who was in very poor health. The doctors had said that they had done all they could do, so I was looking around. I met a friend there, a physician who lived in Texas, and he said he had a friend in Boulder who had taken his wife there for her health, and he would write to him and see if she was getting any benefit. This friend of his was a judge, and in reply the doctor got a nine-page letter, because he had asked for a detailed statement of what he thought of the institution. He said that his wife was getting along splendidly at the sanitarium. I told my wife that we would pack up and go to Boulder. She was so ill that it was hard to get to Boulder, and when we got there, we had to stay in the hotel for three days, they were so full at the sanitarium. Finally we succeeded in getting a room at that institution. My wife was there about six weeks, and her health gradually returned. And that is the reason I said, "A sanitarium will be built in Wichita," and you can see a portion of the structure, for it is going up.

'There must be a reason always for a forward move, and I suppose that the great Master of the universe puts it in

the hearts of men to do some things. We gave of our means to help start a small institution on Market Street, and a United States senator, who had broken down his health in the campaign, visited that place, and regained his health. He was enthusiastic that an institution should be built here, and promised his support.

"We have already paid for these twenty acres of excellent soil, and have turned over eighteen hundred dollars in cash besides. We want $5,200 more, and we are going to get it. I learned of a gentleman who was at the Boulder Sanitarium, and went to him and asked him if he had been benefited there, and he said he had. I said, 'I want you to give me two hundred dollars.' He said, 'I will do it,' and drawing a hundred-dollar bill out of his pocket, he subscribed his name for two hundred. He did it cheerfully, because he had been going down and down, and now the bloom of health is on his cheeks.

"I stepped into the office of a lawyer a few days ago, and said, 'I have come to see you about this sanitarium;' he said, 'Don't say another word;' he then wrote a check and handed it to me, and went to his partner and spoke to him in regard to the matter, and he wrote a check for the same amount. That is the kind of reception we are receiving from our citizens whom these worthy men have shown what the institution means.

"Every morning the first thing we would hear in Boulder, when we would rise from our slumbers, would be the songs of Zion, and the prayer going up for the blessings of the day, that the sick in the rooms of the institution might be brought back to health; and the great God listened and heard those prayers, and then just before the eight o'clock breakfast, the patients would assemble, and Elder Wilcox would lead them in worship, reading a suitable portion of Scripture, and joining in prayer for their restoration to health. I say, God heard and answered their prayers. I saw people who had been carried in there on cots, go home after a brief stay, having been brought back to perfect health."

Elder C. McReynolds also briefly addressed the assembly on this occasion. Holding up a copy of the Bible, upon the principles of which he said the institution was founded, he stepped forward and deposited the same in the corner-stone, as a token of that faith, after which the stone was placed.

The sanitarium building is erected upon an elevation commanding a beautiful view in every direction. It is veneered with brick, fronts the east, has a capacity of about thirty-five patients. The measurements are forty-four by eighty-eight feet, four stories, and the wing to the west is thirty by thirty-two feet, three stories high. The sanitarium has its own water, heat, and electric-light plant. A lawn of four acres surrounds the building, covered by three hundred young shade-trees. The rest of the twenty acres is largely used for garden purposes. Several acres has already been set to fruit of various kinds. The ground is considered valuable. The cost of the land, and the building with its splendid equipment, is nearly thirty thousand dollars.

Several weeks ago the Board was glad to announce to friends and waiting patients that June 14 would be set apart as the formal opening of the Kansas Sanitarium. The building was crowded with a desirable class of guests, who listened attentively to a suitable program of speeches and music. Dr. David Paulson delivered the opening address, "Need of Our Sanitariums, and Work Accomplished by Them." The sentiments he expressed met a hearty response from our visitors. Following the program our visitors inspected the building and equipment, before partaking of refreshments. City friends furnished large palms for the rooms and corridors, hanging baskets for verandas, and three hundred parlor chairs, for the occasion. For months the confusion incident to our building work could not keep away a number of those about us seeking physical relief, hence we enjoyed considerable patronage before the place was ready for inspection.

During the past year Dr. B. E. Fullmer has been connected with the institution as medical superintendent. Success has attended the work from the start, the income meeting all running expenses. Some have found relief from physical maladies which to all human judgment, seemed hopeless; by careful treatment, with God's blessing, they have been restored to health. We are meeting a class of people here that we would probably never be able to meet in any other way,—doctors, lawyers, merchants, business men of all classes,—with many opportunities to teach them how to live, and especially that these truths are of heavenly origin. We realize that the Lord has worked for us, and that this building is his planting. He has sent his angels before us to prepare the way, and to speak to the hearts of the people to send help for the upbuilding of his cause, that souls may not only be healed of their physical suffering, but may be pointed to "the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world."

L. C. CHRISTOFFERSON.