Bishop Joseph Busch with Mother Louise Walz, prioress, and Sisters Priscilla Schmidbauer, plant manager, and Ethelburga Farrell, treasurer, are on the podium dedicating the land purchased for the construction of the St. Cloud Hospital which was finally built beginning in 1926 and completed in 1928.
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).
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.