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Drs. James and Richard C. Beebe: The Lives, Legacy & Hospital of the Brothers Beebe
The word “Beebe,” by which Beebe Medical Center on Savannah Road is commonly known is on the lips of everyone in Lewes almost daily. Every day babies are born in Beebe; surgery is performed in Beebe; and people’s lives are saved in Beebe’s emergency room. Yet this institution would never have existed if it were not for two brothers, Drs. James and Richard C. Beebe, who lived in Lewes in the early twentieth century and founded the original Beebe Hospital in 1916. While founding the hospital does not count as the least of their achievements, it does count as only one of the fascinating realities of their lives. James and Richard C. Beebe, with their sisters Esther and Anna Elizabeth, were the children of Richard Beebe, Sr. and his wife Temperance Jane Magee Beebe.1 The father of the four children, who would at one time be referred to in a local paper as “the oldest life-long resident of Lewes,”2 worked as a storekeeper, hotel proprietor, postmaster, plasterer and bricklayer at different times during his career.3 The elder of the two brothers, James Beebe, graduated from Lewes High School and the former Goldey College in Wilmington, DE. He obtained his medical degree from Thomas Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia in 1906,4 and in the summer of that year, he acquired the office in which he would set up practice.5 This office had formerly housed the practice of another Lewes physician, Dr. David Hall, and was purchased from his estate.6 Since Dr. Hall had served as the president of the Medical Society of Delaware in 1881,7 the office where he had practiced already had a place in local medical history when Dr. James Beebe acquired it. The time-honored status of the Medical Society of Delaware itself, which had been formed by an act of the General Assembly on February 2, 1789 to become the third organization of its kind in the nation,8 gave Dr. Hall and his former office an even firmer place in this history. Once the office had come into Dr. James Beebe’s possession, he had it moved to property on Savannah Road, which was adjacent to his father’s home.9 The office thus became situated in the same location where the modern Beebe Medical Center would stand,10 and the career of Dr. James Beebe began in a building where local medical history had been made in the past as well as at an address where it would be made in the future. As Dr. James Beebe practiced medicine at this significant location, his younger brother Richard prepared himself for a medical career, and in 1913, became the second of the two brothers to obtain a degree from Thomas Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia.11
The newlyweds, Miss Stetser relates, found themselves bombarded with rice and confetti immediately after the ceremony, and endured several more showers during the subsequent celebration16 The last shower came as they left for a honeymoon which included a boat trip to Virginia and visits to Washington and Baltimore.17 In the year after his marriage, Dr. Richard C. Beebe joined his brother James in practice in the office on Savannah Road.18 At this stage in their careers, however, the Beebe brothers practiced not only in their office, but also during house calls. Captain Tilney Clarke Conwell, who was one of their patients as a child, provides a vivid description of the procedures they performed during a visit to his farmhouse:
“Early on a summer morning in 1915 or 1916 two Doctors Beebe arrived at our farmhouse and proceeded to establish an operating facility in one of the bedrooms. When all was in readiness they etherized and performed tonsillectomies on my sisters Frances and Isabel, my brother William and me, I being the last. As each operation was completed the patient was taken to the four-bed ‘recovery ward’ in the large corner bedroom with the three small windows in the attic above. By the time my turn came the second floor contained a heavy scent of ether to which I had taken a great dislike. The doctors tried to hold me down and apply ether but had more important things to do so simply switched to chloroform which was most pleasant and I went out like a light.”19 When the Doctors Beebe did find themselves in their office, they turned their attention to founding a hospital. In 1916, the two brothers, recognizing how desperately the rural area in which they lived was in need of modern medical services,20 built an addition across the back of their office in which such services could be introduced.21 This addition, with two patient rooms, three beds and an operating room, became the original Beebe Hospital.22 In the same year during which Dr. James Beebe co-founded Beebe Hospital, he distinguished himself in the medical profession in another significant way. It was in 1916 that he first followed in his office predecessor’s footsteps to become the president of the Medical Society of Delaware, and he continued in that office in 1917.23 Meanwhile, the nation prepared itself for its possible entry into the cataclysmic war which was raging overseas. On April 14, 1916, a committee representing five great medical and surgical associations met in Chicago and tendered the services of the medical men of the United States to the President.24 When the United States did enter the war in 1917, Dr. Richard C. Beebe heeded the call for doctors overseas,25 and became one of the 37 out of 240 Delaware physicians eligible for active duty26 to enlist in the active services. With a unit largely recruited from chiefs at the Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia, he traveled to Le Treport, France to serve at Base Hospital 10,27 which took over Hospital No. 16 of the British Expeditionary Force.28 As a base hospital, this institution was defined as “a hospital within the Services of Supply to which the sick and wounded are sent from the forward areas.”29 Since this base hospital in Le Treport was not far from Ypres, where mustard gas first had first come into prominence on July 12, 1917,30 it is not surprising that hundreds of the patients sent there night after night suffered from the devastating effects of the chemical weapon.31 Mustard gas attacks the skin, eyes, and bronchial tubes,32 inflicting a torment which is all the more insidious since the victim feels no discomfort at the time of exposure,33 and may not experience any effects for up to twelve hours later.34 The symptoms which then begin to develop are aptly recorded in the account of one World War I nurse. She describes patients experiencing them as “burnt and blistered all over with great mustard-coloured suppurating blisters, with blind eyes…..all sticky and stuck together, and always fighting for breath, with voices a mere whisper, saying that their throats are closing and they know they will choke.”35 From this account, it is easy to surmise how those afflicted with mustard gas poisoning must have fared when they first came under the care of Dr. Richard C. Beebe and other medical staff at Base Hospital No. 10. Once the Allied victory brought the hellish war in Europe to a close, Dr. Richard C. Beebe could return to his practice in Lewes and the hospital he had helped to found. The addition of a cement block wing in 191936 increased the bed capacity of that hospital from three to sixteen.37 Meanwhile the brothers and the hospital had gained attention elsewhere. By 1921, Benjamin F. Shaw, a prominent Wilmington resident who had made several summer visits to Rehoboth Beach, offered to finance a substantial expansion of the hospital in Lewes.38 A contemporary newspaper article tells of how Shaw’s admiration for the work of the Beebe brothers inspired this offer: “Impressed with the excellent work accomplished by two physicians and surgeons, Dr. James Beebe and Dr. Richard Beebe of Lewes, with only restricted space and facilities at their disposal, a well know citizen of Wilmington, Benjamin F. Shaw, has come forward with the generous proposition to provide at his own expense additional buildings and equipment.”39 The Shaw building was erected in the place of the original hospital, which was moved across the street, expanded, and converted into a home for student nurses. The renovations financed by Shaw brought the bed capacity of the hospital to 35, gave it operating, x-ray and delivery rooms, and provided it with the latest medical equipment.40
In the following years the hospital continued to expand. In 1927, Mr. and Mrs. Shaw expanded the Shaw building by adding a wing in memory of their daughter Natalie Townsend.43 The erection of the Mary Thompson Annex would follow, after Mrs. Thompson, who had been treated in the hospital in 1934, raised over $100,000 in funds for the project.44 The hospital itself raised the funds for the next building it obtained.45 This new building, which became the main entrance to the hospital,46 took its name from a lifelong friend of Dr. James Beebe, Harry W. Lynch, Sr.47 Mr. Lynch was a retired Dupont Co. executive who had served as chairman of the special gifts committee during the hospital’s building fund campaign. When the dedication of the Harry W. Lynch Wing occurred in 1963, he was treasurer of the Beebe Hospital Board of Directors and chairman of the finance committee.48 As the Beebe brothers contributed to the continued growth of the hospital, they contributed to the growth of other organizations as well. Dr. Richard C. Beebe displayed an interest in American veterans compatible with his World War I background by helping to establish several posts of the American Legion in Sussex County,49 and was once elected State Commander of the American Legion [Dept of Del.]50 When World War II struck with all of its unspeakable horror, Dr. Richard C. Beebe, who had once traveled overseas to treat US and Allied servicemen, would find the soldiers defending his nation and its Allies seeking treatment in the hospital he had helped to found.51 During the war, when a large number of ships were torpedoed off the Atlantic coast, many of the survivors arrived at Lewes in life boats52 and sought treatment in Beebe Hospital. At this time the Duke of Windsor extended enduring recognition to both the servicemen and the hospital by visiting British subjects being treated there after surviving the torpedo raids.53 Dr. James Beebe, like his brother Richard, brought his efforts to benefit others both to Beebe Hospital and elsewhere. He spent much of his career studying cancer,54 and during 1955-1956, he served as president of the Delaware Chapter of the American Cancer Society.55 In 1956, the society awarded him a medical recognizing his work in promoting cancer detection clinics.56 In the same year, his Jefferson peers honored him for his distinguished overall career.57 That career extended to the field of education as well as the medical field. He served on the Lewes School Board for 21 years and on the State Board of Education for 15 years, spending six years of his service in the latter organization as its president.58 In 1954, Dr. Richard C. Beebe became the first of the brothers to die. At the time of his death, Dr. Richard C. Beebe was a member of the American Medical Association, the American College of Surgeons and the Jefferson Hospital Alumni Association.59 The service rendered by Dr. Richard C. Beebe would be warmly remembered long after his death. Jack Hill, who was related to the physician’s daughter Estella by marriage, described her father to her in a letter of 1986 as “such a wonderful doctor, not only as the greatest I ever knew, -- also the most considerate and so kind and understanding to everyone.”60
Eight active members of that club carried the coffin at his funeral,69 and approximately fifty-five other people were invited to serve as honorary pallbearers at the event. These honorary pallbearers consisted of medical and educational professionals, and prominent Delaware figures, including Lewes Mayor Otis H. Smith and Delaware Governor Elbert N. Carvel.70 Prominent Delaware figures would continue to honor the brothers years later. At an open house held at Beebe Hospital in 1970, Delaware Governor Russell Peterson described the doctors as “men of vision” and spoke of their common goal of introducing modern medical practices to rural Sussex County.71 The two doctors brought these practices to this area when they founded Beebe Medical Center, and contributed to their advancement as they helped the hospital grow. Yet the achievements of Drs. James and Richard C. Beebe reached far beyond this. Those of Dr. Richard C. Beebe included serving as an army physician overseas and working to enhance the lives of veterans at home. Those of his brother, Dr. James Beebe, included leading the Medical Society of Delaware, advancing the fight against cancer, and even contributing to the field of education.
Sharron Rose Karrow The Lewes Historical Society 110 Shipcarpenter Street Lewes, Delaware 19958 Tel: 302-645-7670 Fax: 302-645-2375 E-Mail: research@historiclewes.org ©2002-2005 The Lewes Historical Society |
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