A Glimpse of the Voices in the Sanitorium Mini-Museum
Though the 2009 components of my novel are fictional, as far as characters and some of the settings, the diary excerpts from 1931 are based on actual characters I “met” through interviews with relatives, photographs donated to me, trips to local historical societies, and hours reading old newspapers. I began collecting more “artifacts” related to Richard B. Smith’s time in the West Mountain Sanitarium as I researched. (Smith wrote the classic Christmas song, “Winter Wonderland”)
These 1931 Christmas Seals were used in the campaign to raise money for tuberculosis hospitals across the United States.
A 2010 photo my son took of the ruins of the sanitarium. Can you see the “face” made by the foliage?
The 1921 conductor’s watch my husband found buried about a foot underground sanitarium soil while metal detecting. It’s in pretty good shape for being buried for at least seventy-five years! A toy found near the schoolhouse playground while metal detecting.
Original copies of two of Richard B. Smith’s songs.
A vinyl that includes a Richard B. Smith melody: “When a Gypsy Makes a Violin Cry.” Recordings like this raised support for the Hungarian Relief Fund in the 1950s. Here you can see Smith’s song used in a 1941 film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sUvxeviAKw And you can watch the video of my daughter playing it on her violin for the launch of Voices: https://www.facebook.com/amy.walsh.3192/videos/631815848441099/
Staff and visitors in front of the hospital on the right and below an airing porch on the left. Some of these are characters in the novel.
One of the twenty-nine children who were tuberculosis patients on West Mountain in 1931.
One of my favorite characters in Voices in the Sanitorium, Bart Gilroy. He was an Irish immigrant who came to the US to work on the railways. During his free time, he would hike the mountains because it reminded him of his homeland. One day, he came down Bald Mountain and stumbled upon a sanitorium employee who had just gotten injured in a wagon accident. The worker quit on the spot, and Bart offered to take his job. Bart went on to make the West Mountain Sanitarium a self-sufficient operation with a fish hatchery, chicken coops, potato fields, gardens, and an orchard. He sold the surplus to the county jail and used the profit to purchase items such as playground equipment for the hospital grounds.
Leave a Reply