Subseries: Boston City Hospital., 1864-1975.

Boston City Hospital, established in 1864, served for more than a century as one of Harvard’s affiliated teaching hospitals. Boston City Hospital grew out of the successfully city owned and staffed Cholera Hospital, set up in 1849 to deal with the cholera epidemic. Overcrowding at the privately owned Massachusetts General Hospital convinced founders of the need for a full fledged municipal hospital. Plans for a city hospital began in 1850 following the closure of Cholera Hospital, and in 1851 Elisha Goodnow left the bulk of his estate to the city for this purpose, but no action was taken until 1860. Work began in September 1861, and Boston City Hospital, with 200 beds for medical, surgical, and opthalmological patients, admitted its first patient in 1864. Boston City Hospital merged with Boston University Medical Center to form Boston Medical Center in 1996.