"Seize this very minute"

Sometime after he succeeded John L. Brown, the founding President & CEO of Community General Hospital, Jerry Harris presented each of his vice presidents with a poem, displayed in small plastic stand for desk or book shelf.

Jerry became President & CEO in 1982, and it was probably several years later when he handed out the short verse by Johann van Goethe. Here is a translation by John Anster:

Lose this day loitering - 'twill be the same story
To-morrow - and the next more dilatory;
Each indecision brings its own delays,
And days are lost lamenting o'er lost days,
Are you in earnest? Seize this very minute -
Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.
Only engage, and then the mind grows heated -
Begin it, and then the work will be completed!

Jerry Harris was a key figure in my career. He promoted me to vice president and helped me return to college for an MBA degree. He also freely shared his hospital stories and his sayings about management. Among them was this challenge: "Sooner or later, somebody's gotta do the work!" That was an echo of Goethe's "Lose this day" eloquence.

One of the most impressive things about the leadership of SUNY Upstate Medical University is its action-oriented management team. Dr. David Smith, University President, and Dr. John McCabe, Hospital President, look for and expect results.

At a senior management retreat last fall, Dr. Smith passed out coffee mugs to his Upstate leadership team. "Get-r-done!" the cups read, referring to Upstate's acquisition of Community General Hospital.

To this day, I display in my office the Goethe poem Jerry Harris gave me. It is good to know that Community's work ethic will fit comfortably with Upstate's bias toward action.

Remembering Mrs. Brown

Ula Brown Maclachlan, who passed away Thursday, was the widow of John L. Brown, the founding President & CEO of Community General Hospital. Mr. Brown was hired in 1958 to design and build the new Community Hospital on Onondaga Hill in Syracuse, NY. He retired in 1982 and died in 1986.

Perhaps 15 years ago, Jerry L. Harris, Mr. Brown’s successor as CEO, gave me a file of personal papers that belonged to Mr. Brown – correspondence, personal notes, the agenda of his interviews for the CEO position, etc. Jerry found the papers in his files, and he asked me to review the documents, saving anything of importance to Community General. I made copies of several documents I thought were relevant for the hospital, but most of the papers were personal in nature. I packed them up and sent them to Mrs. Brown.

A while later, Mrs. Brown sent me the kindest note. To today’s sensibilities her note would seem somewhat dated, quaint, perhaps even politically incorrect. But I was touched by her thoughts.

Paraphrasing (from memory), this is what she said. Mrs. Brown thanked me for sending the documents, saying that she read them with interest and that many fond memories were recalled. She said the documents were especially interesting to their children, Bill and Christine. Mrs. Brown commented to the effect that “when a man is at his most productive, his children are too young, too unaware, or too uninterested to understand the significance of his accomplishments.” She said that Mr. Brown's personal papers provided an opportunity for their children to better understand what Mr. Brown had accomplished and what he meant to the community.

Today, I recall Mrs. Brown, her work at Community General as a founding member of the Auxiliary and as a Volunteer, her life in the community, and the love and support she gave to family and friends.

Community's second employee

Two weeks ago, I had a guest for lunch – Community General Hospital's second employee. He is Charles Calagaris and he started work for the Community Hospital Fund on April 1, 1959, more than three years before we opened our doors for the first patient at midnight on January 1, 1963.[1]

Mr. Calagaris was hired by John L. Brown, Community's first employee.[2] There is a plaque in Mr. Brown's honor in the corridor of the main lobby, across from the Business Office. Mr. Brown, who was Community's first employee and administrator, retired in 1982. With Mr. Brown, Mr. Calagaris directed the design, construction, and operations of the new Community Hospital from its opening and well into its first decade. In today's terminology, Mr. Calagaris would have been called Community's “chief operating officer.”
Mr. Calagaris brought me a number of Kodachrome slides, showing the construction of Community Hospital in the early 1960’s. He talked about some of the decisions he and Mr. Brown made in those early years. For example, did you know that CGH was originally conceived in an X-shape rather than the T-shape that was actually constructed? The reason? Air conditioning.

The Carrier Corporation donated air conditioning equipment to the new Community Hospital. In 1963 that made Community the first Syracuse hospital with central air. In planning for that, Mr. Brown became concerned that an X-shape for the building would mean more exterior surfaces. More exterior surfaces would mean greater exposure to heat and cold, making Community's utility expenses higher. So the X-shape was abandoned, and the T-shape we have today was adopted. Community's east and west wings form the top of the “T” with the north wing its stem.

Patient rooms were designed in dormitory style (with beds against the walls), rather than a more conventional hospital-style (with the beds extending into the rooms). This had the effect of reducing the square footage of each room, saving construction costs and creating a less institutional feel. But the dormitory style was controversial at the time. While Community Hospital was still in the design phase, Mr. Calagaris recalls that two prototype rooms were constructed in the S-3 building at Van Duyn to demonstrate how the dormitory-style rooms would work. Doctors and nurses visited the rooms and tried them out before accepting the dormitory style. Beds and equipment of several manufacturers were tested by the original staff in those prototype rooms.

In the 1950’s an intensive care unit was a new concept for hospitals, and none of the local hospitals had specially-designed ICUs. In fact, Community's original plans were made without a dedicated ICU, but Messrs. Brown and Caligaris changed the plans before construction to include an ICU on the first floor, opposite the public elevators (in the area that is now occupied by the Surgery Waiting Room, OR offices, and the Meditation Room). That first ICU had a horseshoe-shaped nursing station with direct line-of sight to each patient from the central core. Community replaced the original ICU in 19851 when the current intensive care unit was constructed on the third floor, north wing with the help of a gift from the estate of Dr. and Mrs. Sorgues.[3]

The original design of the nursery was the result of an experience with a nursery infection in Binghamton. The nursery was designed with four ten-bassinet rooms to permit staged cleaning of each separate room, as the babies rotated through the series of rooms. Remember, the 1960’s were during the post-World War II “baby boom” and Community and all local hospitals were very busy in the baby business at the time.

Mr. Caligaris left CGH in 1970 to oversee the construction of the Plaza Nursing Home on Crouse Avenue (now, Rosewood Heights Nursing Home), where he served as its first administrator. After Plaza, Mr. Calagaris joined University Hospital as its administrator until his retirement. He is still active in health care as the chairman of the board of the Syracuse Home Association in Baldwinsville.[4]

I would be remiss if I did not also recognize the long history of Mrs. Calagaris with CGH. Rose Calagaris began her volunteer work at CGH in 1964, one year after we opened. She continues as an active volunteer today, serving on the main desk on Wednesdays. Over the years she has accumulated 3,636 volunteer service hours at CGH.

It was great to visit with Mr. Calagaris. Both he and Mrs. Calagaris are a big part of who we are and how far we have come.

[1] When I asked Human Resources this week to check Mr. Caligaris’ employment dates, they had to check the archives and found his employee number: 002.

[2] I have written about CGH history in a previous posting: “Where we came from,” November 16, 2002.

[3] When CGH planned the current ICU in the 1980’s, it constructed a mock-up room in Onondaga County’s H-3 building (on the corner of Velasko and Route 173). There doctors and nurses saw and tested different head wall configurations and they assured themselves about the adequacy of space and maneuverability within the ICU rooms.

[4] Mr. Calagaris returned to CGH for six months in 1975, serving as consultant when CGH opened the sixth floor, which was newly constructed and licensed as a skilled nursing facility.

Where we came from

In the early morning hours of January 1, 1963, a baby girl was born at Community Hospital, its first patient. Her birth in the brand new hospital was the result of more than ten years of community planning, including two false-starts.

I know something of this history because in 1985 Morris “Morey” Berman, an attorney and one of the founding board members asked me to lunch. I was one of the “next generation” he wanted to know about the “true story” of Community General Hospital. I was fascinated to hear his story then, and as CGH nears near its 40th anniversary, I found myself telling this story last week to doctors and to business leaders. It is a good time to remind ourselves where we come from.

In the 1950’s there were many aged hospitals in Syracuse, NY. Some of them dated from the Victorian era. The names of some hospitals are not heard anymore, so let me recall that Syracuse was home to A.E. Silverman Hospital, General Hospital of Syracuse, Midtown Hospital, Crouse Irving Hospital, Syracuse Memorial Hospital, Peoples Hospital, St. Joseph’s Hospital, St. Mary’s Hospital, and Good Shepherd Hospital.

There were two false-starts before CGH got underway. The first was a community planning report by a committee chaired by attorney Benjamin Shove (1952), the second by Carrier Corporation’s executive Cloud Wampler (1954). Both community leaders chaired studies that made recommendations. Each suggested improvements and consolidations in the city’s hospitals. Each came to nothing.

Then about 1956, Syracuse newspaper editor Alexander “Casey” Jones checked into a hospital on Irving Avenue for abdominal surgery. He found a roof leaking and one or more buckets to collect the water dripping in his room. He was happy and asked for a room change, but there were no other rooms available. So Casey Jones checked out of the hospital, took a train to Washington DC (his home town) and had surgery there. He returned to Syracuse a number of weeks later and sought out Syracuse Mayor Donald Mead. He asked the mayor for help in developing public consensus to replace antiquated hospital facilities.

Mayor Mead called for an investigation by the City Planning Commission, chaired by Morey Berman, my informant. The result was three days of public hearings at which more than 70 physicians, patients, and business people testified about the urgent need for improved hospital facilities. This generated the third community report that called for an entirely new 300-bed hospital to be constructed away from downtown in an area of “therapeutic green.” Several locations were suggested, and among them the 42 acres of reforested land owned by the County on Onondaga Hill. State Senator John Hughes authored special legislation in Albany which allowed County Executive John Mulroy to deed the land for $1.00 to a new Community Hospital.
How to build the new hospital? The Community Fund was created (now, the Community General Foundation). It was chaired by Leonard Markert Sr. who rented space downtown for the meetings and volunteers who traveled throughout the area seeking donations. Within a matter of months the Fund had pledges totaling more than $7 million, the largest fund raising campaign in Syracuse to that time (and for many years after).

Thousands of people participated in the campaign, many of them pledging small amounts to be deducted from their paychecks every week. The payments were received over several years from employees of General Electric, Carrier Corporation, Crouse Hinds Corporation, New Process Gear, and many from other companies. A US government grant of some $2 million was also obtained under the Hill-Burton Act.

The Community Fund looked for an administrator for its new hospital and hired John L. Brown, a New York native who had recently built a new hospital in Rockford, IL. Mr. Brown became CGH’s the first employee and first president. He relocated to Syracuse in 1958 and started the meetings, designs, contracts, and medical staff recruitment that resulted in the opening of a brand-new Community Hospital of Greater Syracuse in 1963. The first Medical Staff President was Irving Erschler, MD. In November 1964, the new Community Hospital merged with the 79-year old Syracuse General Hospital to form Community General Hospital.

As were the 1950’s, ours is certainly a dynamic time for Syracuse health care. The break-up of the Health Alliance in 2002 and Crouse Hospital’s affiliation talks with University Hospital show a health care environment that continues to change.

What would they say to us today, the people who worked so hard to create CGH during the 1950's?

They would tell us that CGH came about as the result of community planning, individual contributions, and hard work – and they would ask us to hold dear to our values, respecting patients, working closely with doctors, and continuing cooperative planning.

They would say, “Never stop trying” and “Keep getting better.”

They would say, “Take good care of the asset we worked hard to bring to this community.”

They would remind us that our place of “therapeutic green" continues as a vital part of the community’s heath care infrastructure.

We hear them.

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This text was originally sent to the employees of Community General Hospital, Syracuse, NY, as one of a series of letters from the CEO. The text was subsequently posted on the CEO's blog, More than Medicine, started in June 2007.