The site selected for Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital was rural. It was built on the north corner of the block bounded by Third (Pueblo), Castillo, Fourth (Junipero) and Bath Streets. It opened December 8, 1891. At the end of its first year of operation, Cottage Hospital had paid out $2,103.28 in expenses while taking in an income of $2,103.79 - a surplus of 51 cents! From this auspicious fiscal beginning, Cottage Hospital grew until it had to build a new steel-and-concrete complex in 1913, in the same block.
In 1892, Cottage Hospital opened the Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital School of Nursing. In 1923, George Owen Knapp gave the Louise Savage Knapp Hall to the Cottage as a memorial to his wife, 2400 Bath Street. The college named in honor of Louise Savage Knapp was incorporated February 17, 1927. It had two stories of dormitory rooms, class rooms, Reception Lounge, Kitchenett, Dining Room and our living room with a couch, great table for puzzles, TV, radio and piano. We could be reached by calling Woodland 6-6181.Knapp College of Nursing educated young women to be registered nurses until the last class graduated in 1968. Knapp College of Nursing closed its diploma program after 76 years. It was always fully accredited by the California Board of Registered Nurses and National League of Nursing.
The metabolic wing of Cottage Hospital, known as the Potter Clinic, was taken over in 1920 by William D. Sansum M.D., a young doctor from Chicago. He was the first doctor in the United States to isolate insulin for the treatment of diabetes. He obtained his insulin from the pancreases of cattle butchered at Gehl's slaughterhouse on Manitou Road off West Pedregosa Street. Dr. Sansum made Santa Barbara the diabetes treatment center of America until commercial insulin became available nationwide in 1923. The modern Sansum Clinic was founded by Dr. Sansum in the 1930s. Santa Barbara Clinic was Knapp was a 245 bed hospital in 1964, expanding to 400 beds soon after we graduated in 1968.
It had:
• Six med surg departments,
• 26 bed obstetrics, 28 bed nursery,
• ER
• OR
• PACU
• ICU
• ACU
• The only dialysis unit between Los Angeles and San Francisco in 1964.
Clinical experience was at Cottage Hospital, Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles (290 beds) and Patton State Psychiatric Hospital (4,000 beds) in San Bernadino. We no longer staffed the TB hospital, too many students contracted the disease.
The dorm at Patton State Hospital, San Bernadino, California
The day we arrived, a patient climbed up our back stairs, jumped off and committed suicide
We lived on the top floor of this building at Childrens above the clinics which were empty at night
We did our pediatric education at Children's Hospital on Sunset and Vermont in Los Angeles. It was during the riots and we used to climb out on the roof and watch the chaos below
