April 5, 2003

Hospital makes deal to treat war wounded

By BARRY GEAR | News-Journal Staff Writer

DAYTONA BEACH — Color Halifax Medical Center red, white and blue.

The hospital announced an agreement this week to treat members of the U.S. armed forces wounded in the war with Iraq, or people hurt in this country in a terrorist attack or natural disaster.

It isn´t the first time Halifax has helped the nation in a time of crisis.

“For slightly more than four years during World War II and after, Halifax leased its entire facility to the U.S. Army, first as training center for the Women´s Army Auxilary Corps, then as a convalescent center for returning troops who had been disabled or injured,” said Halifax spokeswoman Kate Holcomb.

At the peak of the Welch Convalescent Center´s operation, it housed about 6,000 patients, enlisted personnel and officers, and employed nearly 800 residents, said hospital administrator Dan Lang. The Army built 12 additional buildings on Halifax grounds and installed 4,000 beds, he said. In comparison, today´s medical center has 764 beds.

For the period of the Army lease, late 1942 to early 1947, Halifax moved its operation to the beachside, buying the Robert Wendell Hotel at 614 S. Atlantic Ave. and converting it into a hospital, Holcomb said Friday.

“The move into a smaller building greatly helped the hospital financially, Lang said. Halifax had opened in 1928 only to struggle through some “very hard times” with the start of the Great Depression a year later,” Lang said. “The hospital board had tried to sell the facility at least twice before the Army deal.”

Halifax, which had 125 beds in 1942, was able to downsize, converting the hotel into a 43-bed hospital at first and adding 38 beds a few years later. It also was able to bank part of the $3,000 Army monthly lease payments.

The Army declared the original Halifax District Hospital building and 12 new structures as surplus in 1946, allowing Halifax doctors and nurses to move back in 1947. The Army also agreed to give the hospital board $15,000 to refurbish the original building, enough for new paint schemes inside and air conditioning in some wings.

“In those days, it was pretty neat to have air conditioning,” Lang said.

On the first day back in the original building, Feb. 27, 1947, doctors and staff were presented with a good omen, perhaps, of the growth and prosperity to come. The first patient admitted to the hospital that day, Mrs. Louis J. Pollitz of Wild Olive Avenue, delivered a baby girl, Tonia Marian, at 11:20 a.m.

Now, more than 55 years later, Halifax´s announcement of an agreement with the National Disaster Medical System to provide 25 beds on 24-hours notice, and up to 100 additional beds with four to five days notice, recalls the World War II effort.

The deal, signed March 17, also “helps the Halifax Hospital District if a terrorist attack or natural disaster occurred locally and the hospital became overwhelmed,” Lang said, “allowing the district to send patients to other network members nationwide.”

“You couldn´t handle the thing we´re talking about with a single facility,” he said. “It just makes sense for us to create a network where we can help each other.”

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