As early as 1878 while prospecting for a site to establish a college for men in the Dakota Territory, Abbot Alexius Edelbrock, OSB, became aware of the need for a hospital in the still undeveloped area of Mandan and Bismarck. In 1885 he bought the Lamborn Hotel in Bismarck and succeeded in interesting Mother Scholastica Kerst in converting it to a hospital. It was a challenge to change the settlers' prejudice against hospitals as institutions for the wayward and shiftless. However, after five years and with the expertise of Dr. E. pageQuaine in surgery and Sister Boniface Timmers, OSB, in administration, the hospital gained favor and grew from a primitive institution to one of the finest hospitals in the land. With the help of a donation from St. John's Abbey, the Benedictine sisters were able to repay the abbey for the debt incurred by the original purchase and they named the hospital St. Alexius. By 1913, they were able to build a new hospital and to organize a school of nursing there (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives; McDonald, pages 126-137).
In the early 1880s, several attempts were made in St. Cloud to meet the growing need of provisions for medical care. Dr. A.C. Lamothe Ramsay, lately graduated from Rush Medical College in Chicago, began practice in St. Cloud in 1882. He and the sisters petitioned the city council for funds to help them erect a three-story hospital. When these funds for a hospital were not forthcoming, Dr. Ramsay, in 1885, opened one on his own in Joseph Pendel's newly constructed home. Because he soon found that he could not run his own hospital and at the same time take care of his regular practice, Dr. Ramsay persuaded the sisters to take over hospital work. The community, under the leadership of Mother Scholastica Kerst, was quick to take up the challenge. At first they decided to add a third floor and renovate St. Agnes Academy in St. Cloud (which had closed in 1880) to refit it for hospital use. However, in December, 1885, the sisters purchased a newly erected building on Ninth Avenue from John Kropp for $2,000 and by February announced the opening of the hospital under the name of St. Benedict's Hospital (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives; McDonald, pages 251-254).
In 1887, two years after starting a hospital in Bismarck, North Dakota, St. John's Abbey gave the sisters the minor seminary which was part of the monks' St. Clement Priory building complex of church, rectory and school in Duluth. Encouraged by the success of their hospital in St. Cloud, the sisters converted the seminary to a hospital and named it St. Mary's Hospital (2nd building on the right ). The hospital was transferred to the jurisdiction of the Benedictine sisters in Duluth when they branched off from St. Benedict's Convent, St. Joseph, MN, to form an independent convent in Duluth in 1892 (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives).
The Institute Building or Community Center of Saint Mary's Parish in downtown St. Cloud served as an emergency hospital during the World War I flu epidemic. The Sisters' aided the nurses in caring for the patients.
By 1889 the increased patient rate at St. Benedict's Hospital forced the sisters to look for larger quarters. John Coates and Daniel H. Freeman offered the sisters a five-acre site on the east side of the Mississippi River near the reformatory. The following year, because they were assured that a bridge, road, and even a streetcar line would connect that site with St. Cloud proper, the sisters built a three-story, up-to-date hospital there. Upon Bishop Otto Zardetti's request, it was named St. Raphael's Hospital. For ten years they labored against odds to make this venture a success in spite of the fact that the transportation facilities never materialized. When it became obvious that the site was unsatisfactory, the sisters planned to build another St. Raphael's Hospital (II), this time back on Ninth Avenue next to the site of their first hospital, St. Benedict's Hosptial (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives, McDonald, pages 256-257).
After the fire in 1905, St. Raphael's Hospital (II) was restored and the 3rd and 4th floors added on; this increased its capacity to 90 beds. The building to the right was then converted from an art/music academy to St. Raphael's Hospital School of Nursing (1908-1928). In 1915 the School of Nursing received state accreditation and in 1928 was moved to the new St. Cloud Hospital. [Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives , McDonald, ppage258-259]
Building at the far left is the former first hospital (St. Benedict's) converted to the nursing school. In 1928, when St. Raphael's Hospital was no longer adequate, the sisters built their fourth hospital in St. Cloud, named St. Cloud Hospital; the School of Nursing was moved to that new site. St. Raphael's Hospital was then converted to a home for the elderly, known as St. Raphael's Rest Home; later it became a retirement center for the Sisters of St. Benedict. Then in 1999, it was purchased by a private organization to serve as a shelter for the poor and homeless called "Place of Hope" (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives).
Sister Ethelbert Krenik (1st row, 3rd from the left), second administrator (1929-1938) of the St. Cloud Hospital, attended the Northwest Hospitals Convention at Eli Lilly & Company.