Vigo County Historical Society

Union Hospital comes a long way from its humble beginnings

Union Hospital is an important landmark in Terre Haute, but it had very humble beginnings. In the early 1890s, Dr. B.F. Swafford felt an acute need for a hospital when he had to deliver a baby in his office for a mother who was traveling west in a wagon.

He and Dr. Leo J. Weinstein planned a 20-bed hospital and brought a two-story brick home on the corner of Seventh Street and Eighth Avenue belonging to Mayor W.H. Stewart, naming it Terre Haute Sanitarium. It opened in August 1892. Who would have envisioned that more than 100 years lager, with a few name changes, it would become such a mammoth structure and would serve so many people.

Today, it is a 343-bed hospital and a regional referral center serving seven counties in west central Indiana and east central Illinois. It is the area’s largest not-for-profit medical center and provider of health services between Indianapolis and St. Louis. It has partnerships with Methodist Hospital, Indiana University Medical Center, Riley Children’s Hospital, Clarian Health Network and Associated Physicians & Surgeons Clinic and has a large staff of physicians, nurses and many other health workers.

Union Hospital’s School of Nursing--started by Sister Johanna Baur in 1900--has been run by Indiana State University since 1975. In the same year, along with ISU, the hospital started a Center for Medical Education and, the next year, a Family Practice Residency Program was started.

With the help of various departments, such as laboratory, X-ray, diagnostic nuclear medicine lab, MRI, and the dialysis unit, the hospital provides service to people with many needs.

Hux Cancer Center provides advanced cancer treatments. The hospital provides acute and chronic care, maternity and neonatal services, neuro and laser surgeries and many others. It also provides transitional and home health care and many rehabilitation programs.

Due to the vision of a dedicated doctor and the need for a place for a baby to be born, Union Hospital has come a long way from a mere 20-bed hospital to a giant, modern health care facility.

The postcard pictured depicts Union Hospital as it looked in the 1920s.