San Mateo County Places

Belmont- Ralston Hall

                       Gardner Sanitarium                     

On 18 Aug 1900, Dr. Alden Monroe Gardner, medical superintendent for the State Asylum for the Insane at Napa, purchased the Ralston estate in Belmont for $35,000 from the Union Trust Company of San Francisco. This was to be the home of the Gardner Sanitarium, the state’s 1st private mental sanitarium. (RD 87 #181)

 

 As advertised in the  California State Journal of Medicine in 1904, the sanitarium specialized in nervous disorders, including substance abuse and also served those recovering from serious illness.

 The Directory of Physicians and Surgeons in the State of California for 1908 includes a multi-page advertisement with variety of pictures of the facilities.  It is interesting to note that there are only 24 physicians listed for all of San Mateo County that year.  Of those nine had been in practice in California for less than ten years. The Gardner Sanitarium is the only medical institution listed in the county.  

The Report of the Commission of Lunacy v.6 (Sacramento: 1908 California Commission of Lunacy p106) - Gardner Sanitarium- Belmont stated that the minimum rate for care at the sanitarium wass $125 a month.  There were at that time 33 patients with a maximum bed count of 60.  Nurses did not wear uniforms, so patients would not stand out.  The 79 acre estate allowed patients to roam without interacting with the public.

Although Dr. Gardner died as a patient in his own sanitarium in 1913, his son  P.S. (Sherman) Gardner continued to run it until 1922. 

In 1923 the Ralston property was sold to the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur.  They had been looking to relocate their college from San Jose.  Today, ninety years later, Ralston Hall, mainly closed as funding is sought for seismic restoration is still a part of Notre Dame de Namur University.

Patients Playing Billiards - 1922

                              Ralston Hall                               

• About Ralston Hall
• Wikipedia - Ralston Hall
• Library of Congress - Photographs of Ralston Hall
• Name highlights history of Belmont's Notre Dame

                                  Dr. Alden Gardner (1849 NY - 1913 CA)                         

• The Journal of the American Medical Association, Volume 61, Part 1 p210
• Obit City  reported the death of Dr. Gardner on 28 Jun 1913.

                                           Some residents of Gardner Sanitorium                            

• Wallace Coburn
• Lorna Fosberg

                                            San Mateo County Hospitals                                          

• City of Belmont - The Sanitariums 

San Mateo County Places

St Matthew - San Mateo

                      Red Cross Hospital                                              

Is Red Cross Hospital in San Mateo familiar to you?  It wasn't to me,  or the other indexers that were working in the San Mateo County Record Repository, a few weeks ago either.  Yet many San Mateo County births took place there.  Barry went home and did a little research coming back with the fact that the Red Cross Hospital was the beginning of what is now Mills-Peninsula Hospital.

At the time of the Great Earthquake, there were no hospitals in San Mateo County.  The need became evident and St. Matthew Parish in San Mateo with the support and funding of Mrs. Elizabeth Mills Reid first started a "nurses" home with six beds in 1908.  Rather than try to tell a story that is so much better told in the records of the times, the intention of this post is to help you find some of the many articles that told the tale as it unfolded.

Start with  Nursing in Mission Stations: How a Small Hospital Was Started (American Journal of Nursing 1908 Vol 8, Issues 7-17 p705) where you will read about the installation of Beatrice Woodward, a trained nurse, as parish nurse at St. Matthews.

The American Red Cross Bulletin (Vol 4 pg 89) gives an account of the beginning of the cottage and the updated modern hospital that was opened in Feb of 1909.  You'll also find pictures of the dining room, the Red Cross Guild Ward and the operating room.

In their statistical report, Benevolent Institutions 1910 the Department of Commerce: Bureau of the Census (1913 Washington DC: Government Printing Office, p262) lists only Red Cross Hospital on the Peninsula as a benevolent hospital or sanitarium.

The Directory of San Mateo, Burlingame and Hillsborough for 1912  (p5) reported that the hospital was planning to expand at a cost of $100,000.

The American Red Cross Bulletin expands on that in Vol 8-9 page 193.  That volume has the picture of the hospital above as well as a picture of the sun room that was added to speed patient recovery.

On 31 Oct 1913 the Daly City Record reported that the Troy Laundry Machinery Co. agrees to install a laundry system in St. Matthew’s Red Cross Hospital at San Mateo in 60 days for $3285.

In 1916 The Modern Hospital (vol 7 p34) reported that Red Cross Hospital, San Mateo, CA was planning the addition of a maternity ward.

By 1921 the American Medical Journal (vol 76 p1088) reported five hospitals with 25 or more beds in San Mateo County.  In addition to Red Cross Hospital (45 beds) there was San Mateo County Hospital (60) in San Mateo, Canyon Sanitarium (36) in Redwood City, California Sanitarium (with 100 beds dedicated to TB,  the largest in the county) in Belmont, and South San Francisco Hospital (35).

While some sources state that the name changed to Mills Hospital in the "mid-teens," directories and vital statistic certificates show the name as Red Cross Hospital to about mid 1921.

The Red Cross hospital is just one of many institutions supported by St. Matthew in the early twentieth century.  The parish was also responsible for Bishop Armitage Orphanage, the Maria Kip Orphanage, the Church Divinity School of the Pacific Coast, St. Matthew's School for Boys and St. Dorothy's Rest.

   Links to further information on Red Cross Hospital   

• Beginnings of Mills Hospital in San Mateo  The Daily Journal 12 Sep 2011
• Caring for Generations at Mills-Peninsula

   Links to further information about Elizabeth Mills Reid  

• Peninsula Royalty: The Founding Families of Burlingame-Hillsborough: Elizabeth Mills Reid
• Historic Sarnac Lake Wiki - Elizabeth Mills Reid

   Links to further information about St. Matthew Parish   

• History of the Parish of St. Matthew
• The Churchman 24 Aug 1909 pg 603

San Mateo County Cemeteries

Cath Madden Trindle

I love this cemetery.  Elegant tombstones crowd each other throughout.  


The Italian Cemetery was established in 1899 by La Società Italiana di Mutua Beneficenza.  The Società was founded in 1858 to provide medical care and death benefits to its members.  Membership was comprised mainly of Italian immigrants who came to San Francisco during the Gold Rush era.

Burials in the cemetery include more than 8000 reburials from the Italian section of Golden Gate (City) Cemetery.  This is not a mass grave, each reburial was moved by the Società to the new cemetery when the San Francisco cemetery was close.

Today the cemetery is a non-profit, public benefit corporation and burial is open to all nationalities and faiths.   

Family Search has digitized the daily logs and card catalog for the entire cemetery  .Images are available on the website [California, San Mateo County, Colma, Italian Cemetery Records, 1899-2011].  The first three volumes are indexes covering the years 1899-1997.  

Use the index to find entries in the daily logs and card files.  The card file gives information on all the burials in a plot.  Often you can find family members this way. You might also find the burial date, an age the amount paid for the burial, and information on the mortuary. 

Italian Cemetery has also uploaded their entire burial data base to Find-A-Grave.  There are over 46 thousand burials listed.  

You can find directions to the cemetery, which is located at 540 F Street in Colma, on Google Maps, Before visiting the cemetery familiarize yourself with the layout by using the cemetery map that is available on Find A Grave  

Italian Cemetery on You Tube Cemetarian Digs the 'City of Souls' NBC Bay Area 
Italian Cemetery on FindAGrave

Italian Cemetery on Facebook

What's Happening in April

General Meeting at Grace Lutheran Church, 2825 Alameda de las Pulgus, San Mateo, CA 94403.

Date: Wednesday 17th April at 7:30 pm

Sea of Troubles: The Lost Ships of Point Sur

Speaker: JoAnn Semones

Maritime author and historian, JoAnn Semones, will give a lecture on her latest work, “Sea of Troubles: The Lost Ships of Point Sur,” this is the third book in her captivating series focusing on shipwrecks at lighthouses along the Central California Coast. Others include “Hard Luck Coast: The Perilous Reefs of Point Montara” and “Shipwrecks, Scalawags, and Scavengers: The Storied Waters of Pigeon Point.” Join JoAnn and sail into the mystery of history. JoAnn is both a scholarly researcher and an author who knows how to make her stories of shipwrecks, disasters and near disasters come to life.

Digging For Roots Online

By Dennis L. Maness, MLS

  

I’ll have the privilege of attending RootsTech 2013 in Salt Lake City this year. It’s turning out to be the biggest genealogical conference ever in the U.S.—5000 people have already registered!

Now here’s the “online” part—13 of the classes will be broadcast including the usually very exciting keynote addresses.

There was an announcement about what else will be broadcast on the FamilySearch Blog at http://goo.gl/ojQpj. And even better news, you don’t have to watch at the same time as the broadcast, they will be archived on the RootsTech site just as they did last year so you can watch them anytime.

The really exciting news is that right now you can download the syllabi of all the classes on the RootsTech site. Click on the “Schedule” link on the left side of the page, click on “Main Schedule. Under the “Session” column there are links in red to the syllabus of each class. I don’t know how long the links will be up so you might want to download them now.

I personally thank RootsTech and FamilySearch for doing this; it’s a great way for those of you who can’t attend the conference to learn new things and methods.

SAVE THE DATE

SMCGS Trip to Sutro Library                                       

Tuesday 23^th April at 10.30 am for a

Brief Library Orientation

Followed by time for researching the collection

 

Plan to car pool to the San Francisco State University Campus meeting at 9.15am.  More information about meeting points to follow.  There is garage parking on campus at a cost of $6 per day (pay with bills, no coins or credit cards accepted)

Please e-mail president@smcgs.org if you are interested in being a part of the group visiting Sutro Library.  Group limited to 20.

April Workshop at Canada College Library

Date:  Tuesday 9^th April 2013 2.30pm – 4pm

(note:  date is 2^nd Tuesday due to college closure 1^st week in April)

Topic:  What’s New at Family Search

Speaker:  John Gleed

Please register by emailing librarian@smcgs.org

 

Cost:  $5 SMCGS members, $10 Non-members