Delaware County NY Genealogy and History Site

SMITH HOSPITAL was primarily run by Dr. Walter Eells in a Victorian-era house at 36 Townsend Street. It was probably founded circa 1925, on Liberty Street, by his mother and step-father, Carrie and Dr. William G. Smith, and relocated to the Townsend Street property a few years later. The maternity section of the hospital, which was on the first floor of the Townsend Street building, ceased accepting new patients in January of 1967, in order to make room for its planned conversion to the Smith-Eells Nursing Home on August 1, 1967. The nursing home closed in July of 1975, after New York State instituted new nursing home regulations that the building could not meet. Patients were transferred to boarding homes or to nursing homes in Delhi, Roscoe, Liberty and Sidney Center.

STEVENS HOSPITAL, at 60 Mead Street, was opened by Rhoda Stevens, a registered nurse, circa 1940 in another Victorian-era house. It closed February 1950, shortly after her marriage and shortly before the opening of DVH. Her patients were transferred to Smith Hospital.

If you are interested in what life was like for a Walton doctor in the early 1900s, I heartily suggest "The Recollections of A Country Doctor," by Dr. James A. Holley, published 1939 by Meador Publishing Company, Boston. -- submitted by Carolee Inskeep, posted to this website August 7, 2010