Beulah Home and Maternity Hospital

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Overview

The Beulah Home and Maternity Hospital was founded in 1896 by Mr. and Mrs. O. H. Richards. It was located at 2142-2144 North Clark Street in Chicago. Oddly enough, the area itself is notorious in Chicago History, as two doors down from the Home, seven members and associates of Chicago’s North Side Gang were murdered in the Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre (14 February 1929).

The Beulah Home and Maternity Hospital is not only connected to the dark side of Chicago history through its geographical relationship to the Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre but was also the place of suffering for many women who came to the home seeking help.

In 1913, the Curran commission, a committee created by the Illinois State House of Representatives to inquire into the methods and actions of charitable institutions and organizations licensed by the State of Illinois, visited the home. They found that in 1913, the women and expectant mothers were living in deplorable conditions and having to do difficult physical work, such as scrubbing floors, cleaning, etc. all the way up to giving birth and shortly thereafter.[1] “In order to force the girls to work, even when they are in no condition to do work, they are threatened with being thrown out. At least one girl was forced out under this rule, and she sought refuge in the Chicago Maternity Hospital.” “We find that these conditions exist because of the attitude of the superintendent, Mr. Richards, as they all seem to exist by his direction or acquiescence. We do not believe that any of the directors are cognizant of any of these conditions.”[2]

During the Curran legislative committee, Dr. Macy B. Weinberg charged O. H. Richards with cruelty, stating, “I think that Richards is mentally unbalanced… He has two hobbies, illegitimacy and the Bible. He talks of the first and quotes the second to the girls constantly. He recites passages of the Bible to them that I would not even repeat. He tells the girls that they put on tight skirts to attract men and that they deserve all they get. He tells them they should lie down on the floor and lick up the crumbs like dogs. Besides that, Richards shows a peculiar interest in the identities of the men responsible for the condition of the girl. Some of the girls believes he uses this knowledge for his personal interest.”[3]

When Weinberg was asked about Richards’ financial condition, she answered, “I know that he now lives in luxury in a beautiful home… Whereas, before he took charge of the Beulah Home, he lived in apparent poverty.”[4]

Shortly after this investigation, Richards departed as superintendent of the Beulah Home.

In addition to this investigation, it came out in the 1930s that a doctor connected to the Home operated what could be called a “baby farm” in Michigan—Rev. Edward L. Brooks operated out of Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. In Beulah, Michigan, he faced harsh criticism, “Those neighbors never did approve the resort for unmarried mothers and baby bastards which this retired Congregational clergyman operated at Beulah. They suspected that Brooks let poor babies die or even had them killed, that he buried them in the dune sand among the second growth birches of his 80-acre place where brambles and goat tracks quickly erased all trace of the graves.”[5] He faced murder charges for his baby farm in Beulah, Michigan. He was cleared on the charges brought in Chicago.

After the death of a mother and child at the Home in 1927, the hospital faced extreme scrutiny, however it was not until 1934 when its license was revoked. In 1935, the president of the Chicago Board of Health said “the revocation followed receipt of complaints that conditions about the hospital were insanitary and that unwanted babies were disposed of.”[6]

Institution Name and Type

Alternative Names: Beulah Home; Beulah Home and Hospital; Beulah Home for Girls; Beulah Home for Unfortunate Women

Type of Institution: Maternity, Orphanage

Location and Building

Address: 2142-2144 North Clark St.

Locality: Chicago

County: Cook

State: Illinois

Notes on the buildings: No longer exists.

The building sat two doors from the garage where seven Chicago bootleggers were massacred on St. Valentine’s Day in 1929.[7]

The Beulah Home was comprised of four three-story brick buildings.[8]

Administration Information

Date of Founding: 1896

Dates of Name, Place, Mission Change, or Merger:

Date of Closure: 1934

Related to: Brooks Farm, Beulah, Michigan

Administration: Private (founded by Mr. and Mrs. O. H. Richards)

Support/Funding: north side churches and North Side Women’s Club.[9]

Notable People

Rev. Edward L. Brooks

Dr. Alice Lindsay Wynekoop, Chicago doctor who was convicted and served time for murdering her daughter-in-law and sent many cases to Dr. Brooks from Illinois.[10]

Dr. S. M. Todd, woman physician who served as house physician and resident doctor around 1916.[11]

O. H. Richards, superintendent and founder of the home.[12]

Miss A. M. Kimball, matron in 1916.[13]

Miss Frances McCleary, nurse in 1925.[14]

Miss McCabe, nurse in 1913.[15]

Ann Paulson, nurser in 1907.

Intake Information and Requirements

Intake Gender/Sex:

  • 1910: Female Adults, Male and Female children

Intake Age:

Intake Ethnicity/Race:

  • 1910: All

Intake Specifics:

  • 1910: Class of cases treated—obstetrical
  • 1913: Expectant mothers of illegitimate children are sent to this home by courts, the United Charities, and by pastors of churches.[16]
  • 1916: Mother must remain at the home and care for her baby for at least 6 months. Girls are received from the Juvenile and municipal courts, charity organizations, police, “responsible individuals,” etc.[17]

Placement Specifics:

  • 1910: Placement of babies through Illinois Children’s Home and Aid Society if necessary.[18]
  • 1913: In the 18 years of its existence only three children have been placed in family homes.[19]

Number of Residents:

  • 1913: 10 expectant mothers were in resident during the committee’s visit.[20]
  • 1916: Five children and 13 girls were residents at the time of an inspection in June 1916.[21]

Past Residents:

  • Evelyn Smith was a resident of the Beulah Home and Maternity hospital in 1925. She gave birth to a child on 20 December 1925. At the time of the child’s birth she was attended to by only Miss Frances McCleary, a self-trained nurse. The child only lived 40 minutes and Evelyn passed away on 29 December 1925.[22]
  • Ethel Tilbury, also known as “LittleEthel”was a 12 year old girl who gave birth to a baby in Beulah Home in 1910.[23] According to a 1913 investigation, “The home acquired a great deal of advertising and contributions through the exhibition of Ethel Tilbury, a little twelve year old mother. Pictures of her and her baby were taken and these were used to advertise her very much to her detriment. People who came to the home were always shown Ethel Tilbury.”[24]
  • Nellie Franks from Cedar Rapids, Iowa.[25]
  • Edith Lee gave birth to a ten month’s baby.[26]
  • Irene Carr was 15 years old when she came to Beulah on 5 January 1912. The day after arriving she was “required to scrub six flights of stairs in four apartment buildings, the third floor of the hospital, the chapel, and the dining room floor. She then waited on 52 girls, set the table, cut all the bread… The day before her baby was born she scrubbed eight flights of stairs in the above institution, swept out the chapel, cleaned out the store room and lifted heavy trunks. She had been sick in bed, but she was taken down the stairs and had to wait on all the girls, and later scrub the chapel. While weak with labor pains she had to sit through a sermon delivered by the superintendent. The next day she was on the table eleven hours and the instruments were on the baby five or six hours. She could not be given chloroform on account of her weak heart, and accordingly heard all that was said. In delivering the baby one of its eyes was punched out, but the eye was put back into place. On the eleventh day she got up, swept thirteen rooms and scrubbed on her hands and knees, and the stitches broke, and after the wound was sewed up again she left the home. Richards [the superintendent] made no effort to prosecute the man that caused her ruin.”[27]
  • Mary Lapalla gave birth to a daughter at Beulah Home in May 1907. She confessed on 30 May 1907, that she had killed her two week old daughter by throwing her into the lake.[28]
  • Evelyn Frechette was the lover of bank-robber John Dillinger. A few years before she met Dillinger, she gave birth to an infant son, William, in the Beulah Home in 1928. The infant was taken to Brooks’ Michigan farm and died at the age of 3 months.[29]

Records

1916: “The books of the institution are carefully kept by the treasurer… Most of the records are kept in large envelope on the outside of which is a brief and yet comprehensive record, consisting of date, nativity, name and children, if any, sex, name of girl’s parents, brothers and sisters, occupation, by whom sent and from where sent, church, condition, city, county, date of baby’s birth, sex and disposition made of child. All correspondence is kept in these envelopes. Clerical records are kept in each and every case and are filed for future reference.”[30]

Archives and Museums

Chicago History Museum

“Welfare Council of Metropolitan Chicago records, 1914-1978”

Wisconsin Historical Society

“Anita McCormick Blaine Correspondence and Papers”

University of Illinois at Chicago, Special Collections

“Children’s Home and Aid Society of Illinois records, 1880-1998”

Sources

Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes. 1917. Biennial Report for 1914-1915 of the Department Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, Including Reports of Inspection of Institutions for 1916, For the Year Ending in December 31, 1915. 1917. Springfield, Illinois: Illinois State Journal Co., State Printers. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Annual_Report_of_the_Department_of_Visit/04eICtl2WFwC?hl=en&gbpv=1.

“Maternity Hospitals.” 1913. Found in Journal of the House of Representatives of the 48th General Assembly of the State of Illinois: Regular Biennial Session. Springfield, Illinois: Illinois State Journal Co. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Journal_of_the_House_of_Representatives/XeVQAQAAMAAJ.

“Rev. Edward L. Brooks, Brooks Farm and Beulah Home.” 1935. Times Magazine, 4 February 1935. Accessed at Cook County Genealogy Trails. http://genealogytrails.com/ill/cook/beulahhomestory.html.

[1] “Maternity Hospitals.” 1913. Found in Journal of the House of Representatives of the 48th General Assembly of the State of Illinois: Regular Biennial Session. Springfield, Illinois: Illinois State Journal Co. 1238-1239.

[2] “Maternity Hospitals,” 1913. 1239.

[3] “Beulah Home Head Charged with Cruelty and Graft,” The Day Book (Chicago, Illinois), 28 April 1913, p. 32.

[4] “Beulah Home Head Charged with Cruelty and Graft,” The Day Book (Chicago, Illinois), 28 April 1913, p. 32.

[5] “Rev. Edward L. Brooks, Brooks Farm and Beulah Home.” 1935. Times Magazine, 4 February 1935. Accessed at Cook County Genealogy Trails. http://genealogytrails.com/ill/cook/beulahhomestory.html.

[6] “Trace Chicago Clews in Baby Farm Inquiry,” Chicago Tribune, 25 January 1935, p. 1, col. 5.

[7] “Rev. Edward L. Brooks, Brooks Farm and Beulah Home.” 1935.

[8] Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes. 1917. Biennial Report for 1914-1915 of the Department Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, Including Reports of Inspection of Institutions for 1916, For the Year Ending in December 31, 1915. 30.

[9] Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, 1917. 32.

[10] “Rev. Edward L. Brooks, Brooks Farm and Beulah Home.” 1935.

[11] Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, 1917. 31.

[12] “Maternity Hospitals.” 1913. Found in Journal of the House of Representatives of the 48th General Assembly of the State of Illinois: Regular Biennial Session. Springfield, Illinois: Illinois State Journal Co. 1238-1239.

[13] Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, 1917. 32.

[14] Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, 1917. 32.

[15] “Maternity Hospitals.” 1913. Found in Journal of the House of Representatives of the 48th General Assembly of the State of Illinois: Regular Biennial Session. Springfield, Illinois: Illinois State Journal Co. 1238-1239.

[16] “Maternity Hospitals,” 1913. 1239.

[17] Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, 1917. 31.

[18] Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, 1917. 32.

[19] “Maternity Hospitals,” 1913. 1239.

[20] “Maternity Hospitals,” 1913. 1239.

[21] Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, 1917. 31.

[22] “Maternity home under fire; baby and mother die,” Chicago Tribune, 31 December 1925, p. 3, col. 6.

[23] “Chicago Girl, 12, Becomes Mother,” Chicago Tribune, 2 December 1910, p. 4, col. 5.

[24] “Maternity Hospitals,” 1913. 1239.

[25] “Maternity Hospitals,” 1913. 1239.

[26] “Maternity Hospitals,” 1913. 1239.

[27] “Maternity Hospitals,” 1913. 1239.

[28] “Drowns Her Baby in Lake: Woman Confesses to Murder of Daughter at Rogers Park,” Chicago Tribune, 31 May 1907, p. 1, col. 4.

[29] “Trace Chicago Clews in Baby Farm Inquiry,” Chicago Tribune, 25 January 1935, p. 1, col. 5.

[30] Illinois Department of Visitation of Children Placed in Family Homes, 1917. 32.

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