ORANGE — Frances Ann and her husband, Henry J. Lutcher had long been concerned with the lack of a proper hospital in Orange. Sawmill accidents occurred daily, some were not serious, some were of serious natures that led to amputations or loss of life. All that could be done in Orange was first-aid treatment. Serious cases had to be taken by train to Beaumont. The time taken for transport of the injured often led to complications that could have been avoided had there been a hospital in Orange.

Henry J. Lutcher died October 21, 1912 in Cincinnati, Ohio after suffering a stroke and being confined to a sanitarium. He had only lived a few months after the dedication of the Lutcher Memorial Church.

After a period of time went by Frances Ann threw herself into designing and building the hospital that she and her husband had felt Orange needed.

When the hospital was dedicated in 1921, it was one of the most modern in the United States. As she had done with the church, she spared no expense in her designing and furnishing of the hospital. the grounds of the hospital covered a large tract of land between Second and Third Streets on the east and west and Green and Pine Avenues on the north and south.

The building was completely fire-proof. The frame was reinforced concrete and the walls were hollow tile. The outside was pressed brick with white stone trimming. It was four storied, with electric elevators installed by the Otis Elevator Company.

The hospital could care for 60 patients.

The rooms were plainly furnished, but the furniture was restful and modern. The beds were made by the Simmons Company and the mattresses were furnished by the Sealy Mattress Company of Sugarland, Texas.  The linens were marked with the name Frances Ann Lutcher, as were the blankets. Whether a single private room or a ward for multiple patients, there was no distinction in the furniture or furnishings, all were the same.

An innovation was the location of a signal lampover each door and a button near the patient’s bed to be used when the patient needed assistance. Bedside lights could be turned off by the patient or a nurse.

A newborn baby in the Lutcher family had died due to the lack of an incubator in Orange. Frances Ann made sure that there would be one in the new hospital. She installed in the nursery a Hess Baby Incubator. There was also a specially trained nurse in charge of the nursery, a heated dressing table, weighing scales, and anything else that a newborn baby would need.

The air inside the hospital was a primary concern. There was a Johnson System that washed the air and cooled or heated it, as the conditions changed. Each room had a thermostat and humidostat.  Even when closed, each room could be separately ventilated.

The odor of either was often sickening to patients, so the operating rooms were constructed with doors that closed air-tight to block the either smells from the rest of the hospital.

There was no expense spared in making the operating rooms the finest that could be made. Each operating room had facilities for the dressing and preparation of the nurses and doctors. There were lockers, showers, sinks and lavatories. The lavatories and sinks were fitted with knee and foot controls.

The operating tables were the best available, furnished by the Scanlan-Morris Company of Madison, Wisconsin.  Floors and walls were white tile. Everything was made to be easily and thoroughly cleaned.

The main operating room had a large skylight, as was used at the time. The smaller, secondary operating room had a Noshado light installed in addition to the skylight in that room. The newly invented Noshado light, a series of lights on a circulator frame above the operating table, made it possible to perform operations at night or on cloudy days.

All of the hospital walls were designed with no sharp corners. The rounded corners made it possible to do a more thorough cleaning and sanitization of the floors and hallways.

There was a complete room for sterilization of operating instruments. The Scanlan-Morris Battery Sterilizers used high pressure and heated water. There was a large utensil sterilizer in which the largest pans and basins could be boiled. Every effort was made so that everything used in the operating rooms would be thoroughly sterilized.

Even the water system was designed for additional purity. Even though the water furnished by the City of Orange was already pure and soft, the hospital had an electric sterilizing process that pushed the water through sand baths and then quartz before it was piped through the hospital. This insured sterile water throughout the hospital.

The laboratory, electrical, culinary, and hydro-therapy departments were all furnished with the latest and best equipment available.

Adjoining the hospital was a home for the Physician in Charge.

The staff consisted of six doctors of every branch of medicine, six graduate nurses, and a trained technician in charge of the laboratories. All of the doctors in Orange had privileges at the hospital.

The hospital conducted a school with a three year course of study for nurses. Upon completion of the course and passing the final examinations, the nurse would receive a diploma under the seal of the hospital.

There was a large two-story home on the south side of the hospital that served as the student nurses home. The home was steam heated, and contained a bath and dressing room on every floor. There were also two living rooms, a piano and a Victoria for the enjoyment of the nurses.

Upon acceptance to the nursing school, the students were paid $20 per month, and given the material to make three uniform dresses, collars, cuffs and six aprons. It was then up to the nurses to either make, or have the uniforms made.

The Lutcher Hospital would be the only hospital in Orange until 1942 when the influx of citizens coming into Orange to work in the shipyards brought the need for another, larger hospital. The City Hospital was built in 1942.

 1956 saw the opening of the Orange Memorial Hospital.

Unlike the secret cost of the Lutcher Memorial Church, the cost of the hospital was known. It was $300,000. Today the cost would be over $3, 700,000.

Frances Ann Lutcher died on October 24, 1924 of a heart attack while on vacation in New York. Her second gift to her hometown lasted another four decades.