Reflecting on Beth Israel’s rich history, we want to honor the many namesakes of the 16th Street campus. This post provides brief biographies of some of the men and women whose contributions to Beth Israel’s legacy are more than name deep.
Charles H. Silver was a career public servant, including a term as the President of the New York City Board of Education. He joined the Beth Israel Board of Trustees in 1938 and was its President starting in 1947. He was also active in Jewish-Christian interfaith matters and was a staunch supporter of the Phillips School of Nursing. A highly influential man, the Archives has photographs of Charles Silver with leaders ranging from Vice President Alben Barkley (Truman administration) to Pope John Paul to the discoverer of penicillin, Sir Alexander Fleming. In 1952, the ground was broken for the Charles H. Silver Clinic at Beth Israel Hospital, named in his honor. We have several blog posts dedicated to his legacy, and his New York Times obituary provides a more complete biography.
The Linsky Pavilion is named for Belle and Jack Linsky. Belle Linsky was a Beth Israel Hospital Board of Trustees member, and her husband, Jack Linsky, was the founder of Swingline Staples. The couple was also known for their high-profile art collection, which was eventually donated to the Metropolitan Museum. The Archives catalog has a number of digitized materials about the Linsky Pavilion, which, described as an “ultramodern” and an “unusual circular building” first opened in 1966 and greatly increased Beth Israel’s number of beds.
The Karpas Pavilion, opened in 1966 as a patient care unit, was named for Irving D. Karpas. A childhood friend of Charles Silver, he was a clothing manufacturer and stockbroker. He joined the Beth Israel Hospital Board of Trustees in 1938 and remained on until his death in 1971. His New York Times obituary provides a more complete biography, and photographs of the Karpas Pavilion are online here.
Baird Hall initially opened in 1967 as “a 20-story, 144-unit staff apartment house.” It was named for David G. Baird, who was a stockbroker and philanthropist. His New York Times obituary is available here.
Finally, the 16th Street campus was named for Milton and Carroll Petrie in 1992 due to their more than $21 million in contributions to Beth Israel (according to the 1991 Annual Report) and included the largest single gift ($10 million) to Beth Israel at its time in 1986. Milton J. Petrie was a clothes retailer and Beth Israel Board of Trustees member. The Archives has digitized and undigitized materials about Petrie online here.
Authored by Stefana Breitwieser, Digital Archivist
As we wrap up our 2023 Digitization Project Grant, we are pleased to share a final batch of newly digitized materials – a selection of textual records from the Beth Israel Medical Center alphabetical files, including over 80 World War I letters.
The Beth Israel Medical Center alphabetical files represent a miscellaneous assortment of textual records from throughout the hospital’s history. Each file provides a small insight into one aspect of its organization, which taken together provide a rich material history of the institution. The selection chosen for digitization emphasized materials through the completion of the campus in 1969, and provides insight into the hospital’s management, campus planning, and newsworthy happenings.
Like the annual reports and Board of Trustees minutes, organizational and management records in this selection provide insight into the day-to-day decision-making at Beth Israel for things large and small. The digitized material includes the Rules and Regulations of the Beth Israel Dispensary (1907), excerpts of minutes from the Phillips School of Nursing (1905-1912), minutes from department head meetings (1931-1935), by-laws of the Beth Israel Hospital Association (1947-1960), and directories for the house staff and visiting staff (1950s-1960s).
Campus planning is also a major theme in these materials. From Dazian Pavilion (construction started 1922) to planning for the Linsky Pavilion (opened 1966) these materials closely track the progress, reasoning, and decision-making surrounding the evolution of Beth Israels footprint in the Lower East Side. Of note are a group of articles written by Louis J. Frank, Beth Israel Hospital Superintendent, which describe a range of his theories on hospital management at the time of the construction of the Dazian Pavilion. Topics range from medical humanitarianism to facility planning, from European hospital design to vegetarian hospital food services.
Newspaper clippings (bulk 1909-1933) and press releases (1967-1968) also make up a significant amount of material and would be helpful to anyone interested in events at Beth Israel during those years.
You can browse all the alphabetical files digitized as part of this project here. (Note that some clippings and articles by Frank are still under copyright. The materials will become available as soon as they reach public domain, largely on January 1, 2024.)
Left: Article by Frank titled “The Meatless Diet,” published in the journal The Modern Hospital, which argues that vegetarianism is a healthy, cost-effective way to keep a kosher kitchen in the hospital, 1921. Right: Published speech that Frank gave to the BIH BOT titled “What Price Humanitarianism?” which argued passionately for moral and spiritual obligations to care for the needy, even during times of financial precarity, 1926.
World War I letters
Included in the alphabetical files are three years’ worth of World War I letters (1917-1919) to and from Louis J. Frank. The correspondents are largely Beth Israel doctors deployed to military hospitals on the front lines in France.
This postcard from Captain Leo B. Meyer, head of the BIH Medical Board, to Louis J. Frank pictures Base Hospital No. 3 at the Asile de Vauclaire, a 14th-century monastery-turned-military hospital and home to the Mount Sinai Hospital unit. Meyer was stationed there for much of the war. The Archives have a number of materials on Base Hospital No. 3.
Major topics include daily life of those serving in the war, surgery during battle (particularly limb salvage and amputation), x-ray training for military doctors, and reactions to the Armistice. News of Beth Israel is also frequent, particularly medical and nursing staff shortages, the needs of future and current military patients, accounts of various Beth Israel doctors at home and abroad, and the status of the new Beth Israel hospital building (future Dazian Pavilion). The Influenza Epidemic of 1918 is mentioned throughout, and there are also several references to the Mount Sinai Hospital unit.
These letters are a valuable resource to anyone interested in the role of American doctors serving in World War I. You can browse the letters here.
In light of recent news, the Arthur H. Aufses, Jr. MD Archives remains committed to preserving Beth Israel’s rich history. As part of our ongoing 2023 Digitization Project Grant, we have been digitizing a selection of photographs from the Mount Sinai Beth Israel photograph collection. This blog post seeks to recognize and celebrate Beth Israel employees over the years, naming and putting faces to just a few of the thousands of people who have contributed to the hospital’s history.
Mr. Scemes, engineering staff member, fixing sink at Emergency Department, circa 1930s (link)
Elias Gordon, MD, showing his sculptures at the BIH art show, December 1949 (link)
Mrs. Brumford at her farewell party following her retirement from food services, circa 1950s (link)
1960s
Carmela Pietraniella, patient beautician, November 1967 (link)
Eugene Mills R.PH., Chief Pharmacist, November 1967 (link)
B. Ethel Brewer, staff member at the BIMC processing center, November 1967 (link)
Jack Gradel, Medicaid coordinator, November 1967 (link)
1970s
Leon R. Jones, laboratory staff member, July 1977 (link)
Dick Jannsen, Purchasing Department medical-surgical buyer, February 1975 (link)
Ruth Kirsch, medical secretary for Department of Psychiatry, November 1974 (link)
Mr. Arrogo, patients’ accounts staff member, December 1976 (link)
1980s
Adela Borrero at her farewell party following her retirement as a housekeeper at the MICU, circa 1980s (link)
Mike Centrangol, Methadone Maintenance Treatment Program vocational rehabilitation counselor, February 1982 (link)
Bette Pesetsky, director of grants management, March 1982 (link)
Edwina Thompson, RN and Bernadette Sheehan, RN, December 1981 (link)
More information on this project
As part of the METRO Digitization Project Grant, additional materials from the Mount Sinai Beth Israel collection will be available as they are added to our catalog throughout Fall 2023, including more photographs, World War I letters, and other documentation on the history of Beth Israel through 1969. You can read more about this project here, and see our previous blog post on our annual reports and Board of Trustees minutes.
Authored by Stefana Breitwieser, Digital Archivist
The Arthur H. Aufses, Jr. MD Archives is pleased to share that we recently received a 2023 Digitization Project Grant from the Metropolitan New York Library Council (METRO) to digitize a selection of material from the Mount Sinai Beth Israel collection. METRO’s Digitization Project Grant is designed to support digitization projects for METRO members to enhance the quality and accessibility of library and information resources in the metropolitan New York region. The selection for this grant will be the largest body of digitized materials related to Mount Sinai Beth Israel (MSBI) to date.
Packing is underway! Materials will be digitized by a vendor before being returned to the Archives for cataloging.
Selected material spans from across the history of MSBI. Beginning as a form of Jewish mutual aid to care for marginalized workers and their families living in tenements, the hospital grew to treat and research many of the most pressing issues of the time and the history of the hospital is deeply intertwined with that of the neighborhood. Over its 133-year history, this has included caring for the sick during the Influenza Epidemic of 1918; the development of the Methadone Maintenance Treatment Program in the 1960s, one of the first ever methadone clinics; being an early responder in treating and caring for patients during the AIDS crisis in the 1980s; and responding to the present COVID-19 pandemic. The Beth Israel records broadly document the history of the hospital, and the digitization of this material will allow Beth Israel to be more easily included in historical research related to the broader scope of healthcare in metropolitan New York. At the grant period’s end, more than 7,000 pages of material will be newly available through our catalog.
A big thank you to METRO for their support! You can learn more about past grant recipients and their projects here.
Authored by Stefana Breitwieser, Digital Archivist
This week (December 4-10, 2022) is National Handwashing Awareness Week. As we all know, hand hygiene is a critical component of clinical care and patient safety. In this post we’ll be looking at handwashing campaigns at Mount Sinai Beth Israel over the years. (Click on the images for a larger view, or see the links below to view the item in our catalog.)
Nurse disinfecting hands in milk formula preparation room, September 1952
Handwashing campaign in October 1981 of the Beth Israel Pacemaker (employee newsletter)
Article from the February 1982 issue of the Beth Israel Pacemaker about BIMC’s handwashing campaign
Infection control team demonstrating hand hygiene in the November 1994 issue of Eye on BI (employee newsletter)
