Good Samaritan Hospital (Leland Avenue)
Dallas, Dallas County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The Good Samaritan Hospital served Dallas residents at this location on Leland Avenue for approximately 25 years. Martha Schultze, a registered nurse, opened the facility c. 1920. Schultze received nursing training in her native country, Germany, before immigrating to the United States. She worked in private duty nursing and in hospitals for twelve years before opening Good Samaritan Hospital. Her husband, Ernest, operated a clinical laboratory here which was associated with the facility. When Good Samaritan Hospital opened, staff specialized in maternity services. By 1933, enlargement of and additions to the building, which included an operating room, allowed for the hospital to also offer general services. Staff consisted of registered nurses, student nurses and other aides. Good Samaritan Hospital offered medical treatment to residents throughout the neighborhood, including the elderly, the infirm and those who were unable to afford payment. Good Samaritan Hospital closed in 1945. Martha Schultze, who died in 1966, ran the facility for the entirety of its operating years. Today, it continues to be remembered as a facility that served residents of the area regardless of income or status. Hundreds of children were born in Good Samaritan Hospital, which, through the enterprising efforts of a German immigrant, treated those in need in the growing city of Dallas. (2008)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Around 1920 Martha Schultze, a registered nurse trained in her native Germany before immigrating to the United States, opened Good Samaritan Hospital on Leland Avenue, where her husband Ernest ran an associated clinical laboratory. Starting with maternity care, the hospital added an operating room and general services by 1933 and treated neighborhood residents—elderly, infirm, and those unable to pay—until it closed in 1945. Schultze ran it for the whole of its roughly twenty-five years, and hundreds of children were born under its roof.
Why it matters
It shows how immigrant women helped build the everyday health-care institutions that served America's growing cities regardless of a patient's means.
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Related people
- · Martha Schultze
- · Ernest Schultze
Themes & tags
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