HOSPITALS
61
Treasure Coast Medical Report
PHOTO PROVIDED BY STUART HERITAGE MUSEUM
This is the second group of local women who completed 80 hours of
Nurses Aid classes instructed by Anne Shepard. Left to right, are Mrs. Cecil
Donaldson, Mrs. Anne Heffner, Mrs. Floretta Bartlett, Miss Rose Czverko,
Mrs. Elsie LeTourneau and Mrs. Clara Jourdan. Their photograph appeared
in the Stuart News on June 21, 1945.
to assume nursing duties. She would go on to found the
Hospital Auxiliary.
Martin Health’s story is filled with triumphs and tragedy.
Two of the men on the original board of directors died shortly
after the hospital was completed. Judge E. J. Smith died in
Martin County Hospital in June 1939 at age 47, and Dr. Van
William Burns, who led the drive to build the hospital and
was its chief of staff, died in December 1940 at the age of 38. >>
PHOTO PROVIDED BY PHYLLIS PENCE BEVIS
Mary Nelson of Cleveland, Ohio, was Martin County Hospital’s first
Supervisor of Nurses. She married Phil Pence in 1940. Phil Pence
was mayor of Stuart in 1943, 1944, 1946, and 1947.
/www.southflaortho.com