Inspired by a comment on a post I wrote about the Maryland State Sanitorium (for Tuberculosis patients), I am sharing my Great Grandmother Italy (Bond) Grimes' letter from MSS to The Pilot (Union Bridge, MD newspaper). Anyone wishing to see the full article as it appeared in the paper can visit the Maryland State Archives, in Annapolis and search The Pilot on their computers. Please note: I have not changed the article at all from it's original state, which includes misspellings. At this time in her life, Italy had just turned 25 years old. Her father, Harvey H Bond, was well-respected in the community, a charter member of the Union Bridge Fire Company and a saddle maker. In their small community, everyone knew (and to this day some still remember) Mr. Bond. Thus, I am sure of the many people who inquired to the health of his youngest daughter. Letter from Maryland State Sanitorium March 1, 1920 Dear Home Folks: As there are so very many of you who ask and inquire of me I will write this letter to tell you all a little of my life here on the mountain top, where I am trying to fight my battle for health and strength. First I want to try and describe my surroundings. I am enclosing some cards -- views of the buildings here. We are quiet a family here on the mountain top sixteen hundred feet above sea level. The population is six hundred persona counting Doctors, Nurses and state help. Six Doctors, thirty some Nurses, four hundred and fifty patients. The John Walter Smith reception hospital has two hundred and fifty beds while the children's hospital has fifty beds. We have nine shacks, four on west side (Men's shacks) and four on east side (ladies' shacks). But as there are so very many more men patients here than women, one of the shacks on the east side is used for men patients too, leaving only three shacks for the women. Shack No. 5 is for both men and women patients who pay seven dollars a week and can accommodate twenty patients. The Sanatorium is considered a town as it has a station, Express and Post Office, Church, Library, Notary of Public, Store, Movie Hall, Dentist and Barber Shop, Laundry, pool room and State Laboratory. Dr. Baer entered me here as a patient five months ago, and I have been in shack No. 2 east all of that time except one week in October, I was a hospital patient. To say that I have been blue, discouraged and home sick can only partly explain some of my feelings. But to a certain extent I am happy too. I am happy because each week I feel stronger and nearer to health and am still gaing in weight. I have gained 11 3/4 lbs. in my 5 months cure here. Before I came here as a patient I had to cough day and night. Some nights I could not lie down at all as my cough was so bad. Now I sleep the night through and never have to cough, and in the day sometimes my coughing is hours apart. We all live and our-door life almost entirely. We only get in a warm room to dress and undress and meal time. And of Sundays if we have company we are allowed in our living room or the Recreation Hall. Every night I sleep between sheets with four double blankets and one comfort piled on top, with one or two hot water bottles somewhere near, besides my night clothing of woolen underwear, sweater, helmet, gloves and bath robe. The sky and stars are the ceiling for our slumbers. Last night, February 29, when we went to bed the sky was clear and stars shining bright, along in the night sometime it snowed about 2 inches of fine snow over us and helped to keep us warm. I woke up and the morning train was coming around horse shoe bend, and Oh my, maybe the wind was not a howling. March surely came in as a lion here on the hill top. My next bed chum said "come on Grimes, lets get up before we are blown down in the valley." Well I was very willing to crawl out from under my snow blankets, and we both had our bath and shower before the other girls had started to sit up and take notice of the March weather. Papa, mother and Richard were with me Sunday and when I showed them my bed and where I slept they said well they were satisifed to do their sleeping in Union Bridge. I know Papa was glad whent he train came for he surely was cold all day here. But Sunday was really a nice warm day here for us. We have lots of zero weather here and 4, 5 and 6 below zero besides. We take a hot water bottle to be with us at 9 p. m. and when we get up at 6 a. m. we have either crushed ice or frozen solid. Papa says Union Bridge has had very little zero weather yet. I receive the Pilot every Saturday morning, and read it from one side to-another, then give it to Julia Koons, formerly from Walkersville. When she reads it Ada Wooden from Hampstead gets a turn at it, then I send it first of next week to my brother Howard. So you can guess that one paper does service till it gets around. I surely do enjoy reading Mr. Farquhar's and Dr. Norris' letters that have been in the Pilot, and I surely did laugh when I read of Dr. Baer and his hat. It just seemed to me I could see the Dr. watching his hat blowing away I surely hope everyone on in Union Bridge, who has been on the sick list is very much better by now. I don't know how much longer I will remain here as a patient. When I entered as a patient I expected to stay 3 months, after 3 months of cure my Dr. says I must stay 6 months. I have been here 5 months now and at my last examination I was told my tubercular trouble was not very bad but my bronchial aggravates my tubercular trouble and so my condition improves slowly; and that I can not expect to be cured in a few months of what has been coming on me for the past five years. And if I give up the cure now, my 5 months of cure chasing will only last about two months and I'll be right back where I started from and worse. Quite a pleasant future for me to look forward to, sometimes I don't care how soon I am six foot under and pushing up daisies. But really I don't suppose any one in this world gets as discourages and blue as what lungers do. Every one is afraid of us and our bugs and don't want us near them for fear of catching T. B. from us. I'll tell any one we don't have much to make us happy. The other day at quiet hour we had an argument up which would be the best, to have bugs in the brain of bugs in the chest, (Either insane or tubercular). To tell the truth I would rather have them in the chest, because I think I can enjoy my few real friends better and life as it is given me each day than what I would if I was insane. For then I would not have brain enough to enjoy life at all. And after all this is a beautiful and wonderful world. So I try to live each day as it is give me and be as cheerful and happy as possible. And after all we have a chance to get well again and I am very grateful to have that one chance and chase the cure here. I wish I could begin to thank each and every one for their many kind remembrances of me since I have been a patient here. You, who have remembered me with boxes of good things to eat, fruit, candy, flowers, letters, papers and cards, I can only say "thank you" but I say it from my heart. The nice blanket, comfort and pillows that my friends sent me I surely do appreciate for I know each remembrance was sent me with a kind and loving thought. I am always glad for mail, it can not come too often for any lunger. For we must deprive ourselves of home and children and friends, all that seem worth while and is dear to us. For to be with them means that you are poisoning them with your T. B. germs. Well I must end this scribbling and go to hospital for my gas treatment, hoping that the folks back home will be as glad to read these lines as I am to write them, and hoping that no one who reads them will ever be a lunger and cure chaser like me. Sincerely, Italy Bond Grimes State Sanatorium No. 2 East, Md. P.S Will be glad to receive mail from anyone. To give you a bit more background on my Great Grandmother, at this time she was married and had to leave her husband and 2 small boys behind in Union Bridge to chase her cure. Her family was split up in her absence. Her youngest son, Bill 1 1/2 years old, stayed with her husband's cement plant foreman's family on Main St. Her eldest boy, Sterling, I have not been able to locate in the 1920 census. Dick Grimes, her husband, boarded on Main St in Union Bridge. I am sure that it was a hard decision to leave her family to get well, but that she also did not want to give her children the 'bugs' she lived with for the rest of her life. There is a sadness in her eyes, in later pictures of Italy- that I am sure reflects the hard times she went through.
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When I first saw the picture of my Great Grandmother as a little girl, my breath caught and time transported me to that moment. Her eyes captivated me. She was so young, but I could see longing and sadness in those eyes. What was she thinking in that moment? What had she seen that could give her that expression? I wanted to reach through the picture and hug her. Put my forehead up to hers and wordlessly acknowledge her old soul in that moment. The second thing I noticed in the picture is the locket that is around her neck. I immediately wanted to find out what happened to it. I needed to know it was not lost to time. That where ever it ended up, it was being cared for. It seems silly to say such a thing, but it was the reaction I had.
Four years later, I have found out what happened to that locket. It is still in the family, thank goodness, worn by Italy's granddaughter and great granddaughter. They love that locket so much that they share it. One day, I hope to see it in person. This locket has been in my family for well over a hundred years, since at least 1910. I wish it could speak. What would it say if it could? Would it cry out for my great grandmother? Would it tell tales of adventures she had? Would it sing songs from her youth with a laugh and a twinkle? Would it cough, in remembrance of the time spent on the mountain, trying to get rid of the "bugs" from Tuberculosis? Would it weep at the memory of Italy's losing her siblings when she was young or for losing her mother? I wish it's shallow depth could hold the scent of my Great Grandmother. I would wrap myself around it and breath in the life that I am constantly reaching for. I will need to come back to this post and fill in more details, but I wanted to put a placeholder here to remind myself to discuss this project.
I volunteered, full-time, from October through December (2017). I spearheaded the effort to take the Carroll County Genealogical Society's holdings (books, journals, maps, etc) and inventory, catalog and publish the findings online. The project was a success and after months of data entry - the library webpage has been officially released to the public. More info on this project later. The search for Dr. A Barr Snively's Blue Ridge Mountain Sanatorium continues. To find the site here is a recap of the research gathered so far. The Blue Ridge Mountain Sanatorium pamphlet identifies several key items:
Marked on the topographic map below is an approximate 1 mile radius from the Blue Ridge Summit WMRR station. One thing to keep in mind, however, is that present day maps have different streets and buildings than what was in the area in the time period- June 1905 to April 1916. Currently, I have yet to find a historical street map in this time period. However, the elevation of the land and surrounding areas would not have (naturally) changed that drastically, even in 100 years. Therefore, the elevation of the land is the first consideration. This narrows down the searchable areas to only a few spots from the mile radius image above. A First Impression For the reasons above, my first thought was that Snively's land was situated to the west of Blue Ridge Summit, PA. This would fit the stated description of the elevation of the property. The pamphlet has pictures of the view west, Blue Ridge Summit, and Charmain and Monterey. It stated (but did not include a picture) of the view of Gettysburg which was "a 10 min walk" away. The photographs of those views will hopefully help to identify a more exact location. The mountains in the photos can certainly help to triangulate the sanatorium location. Land Records There are several Snively deeds in Franklin County, PA. Both Dr A Barr Snively and his father I.N. Snively held land in Waynesboro and Washington Township, PA. A closer look at these land records is warranted, if nothing turns up from the Bullet/ Snively deed, below. John Bullet Jr gave Dr. A Barr Snively land in Washington Township in April 1905. Two months later, in June, Dr. A Barr Snively opened his Blue Ridge Mountain Sanatorium. It seems likely that this new property is the one that the Sanatorium was on. But where was the Bullet/Snively property located, exactly? My next step, therefore, is to plot the land out, using the Bullet/Snively deed. After I plot it out, an attempt to locate the land will include going back to the Franklin County archives and/or courthouse to follow the deed forward to present day.
I have been obsessed with researching Dr. A. Barr Snively's Blue Ridge Mountain Sanatorium. I have been trying to help a friend identify the location of the private Tuberculosis sanatorium. Little is known of the Blue Ridge Mountain Sanatorium, most likely due to the fact that two neighboring sanatoriums grew to be large, state run facilities. To the north in Mount Alto, PA was a very large sanatorium- currently the South Mountain Restoration Center (previously White Pine Camp 1901 - 1907, Mount Alto Sanatorium 1907 - 1918, etc). The Maryland State Sanatorium, to the south, in Sabillasville, MD (previously Hilltop Hospital 1907 - 1908) housed over 200 patients by the time Snively dismantled his facility. The "Snively Sanitarium" (postcard circa 1909, above) was located in Franklin County, Pennsylvania near Blue Ridge Summit. When it opened its doors in 1905 the Tuberculosis epidemic was the leading cause of death (below). The fight against Tuberculosis, aka Consumption, had been raging for thousands of years. But Hermann Brehmer's notion of seeking a higher altitude in sanatoriums (so the heart wouldn't have to work so hard to fight off the disease) was a relatively new idea. Medical facilities to treat the disease were few and far between; states scrambled to find suitable sites above sea level where they could build sanatoria. There are various articles on Dr A Barr Snively: his work, professional accomplishments and community involvement which range from helping to select the "State National Guard" camp location to his memberships in various medical associations. There are numerous accounts of accidents in the Waynesboro, PA where the good doctor was called upon to patch people up. He extracted bullets, amputated fingers and eyes, and even reset his own fractured arm. Details are scarce, however, about the Blue Ridge Mountain Sanatorium. Pennsylvania newspapers identify it was near Blue Ridge Summit, PA, and Dr. A. Barr Snively operated it from 1 Jun 1905 and dismantled 18 Apr 1916. The Blue Ridge Mountain Sanatorium pamphlet, below, is the only known publication of the sanatorium in existence today. It is housed in the US National Library of Medicine, National Institute for Health, in the History of Medicine Reading Room (Bethesda, MD). It is my hope to soon unravel the mystery of the exact location of the sanatorium from the clues within. |
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