DUANE
Duane's take
Here's the story as the official marker tells it, out here in Tom Green County. Settle in — this one's got more going on than you might expect from a stretch of highway and a patch of West Texas land. In 1911, the Texas Legislature passed a law calling for the establishment of state institutions for the treatment of tuberculosis.
One year later, in 1912, the Anti-Tuberculosis Colony No. 1 opened right across the highway from where you're standing — or rolling, as the case may be. It started modest enough: 57 patients, a 330-acre tract of land. But modest wasn't going to hold this place for long.
By the time it hit its stride, the colony had grown into a self-sustaining community with an average population of two thousand people. Two thousand. Out here.
The institution eventually spread across 992 acres and filled 36 buildings — and friend, these were not just wards and examination rooms. There was a post office. A library.
A public school. A power plant. A dairy.
A vegetable garden. A bakery. Butcher shops.
This place wasn't just treating people — it was feeding them, educating them, and keeping the lights on all at the same time. In 1915, the Tuberculosis Nursing School was founded here, and by 1961 it had graduated 500 male and female nurses. Five hundred.
The place was training its own workforce. The institution got its first new name in 1919 — the State Sanatorium — and at its height it had treatment capacity for 950 adults and 250 children. Most patients were in residence for nine months at a stretch.
Then in 1955, it was renamed again — this time the McKnight State Tuberculosis Hospital, in honor of Dr. J. B.
McKnight, who had served as superintendent from 1914 all the way to 1950. That is a long tenure for a man keeping a city-sized medical community running in West Texas. Now here's the thing about a place built to fight one enemy — when the enemy changes, so does the fight.
The advent of anti-tubercular drugs and thoracic surgery altered the treatment of tuberculosis, and eventually, in 1971, the institution closed. But before it did, fifty thousand adults and five thousand children had received treatment here. Fifty-five thousand people.
Some of them walked in not knowing if they'd walk out. The marker stands as witness to all of it.
What the marker says
In 1911 the Texas Legislature passed a law calling for the establishment of state institutions for the treatment of tuberculosis. Founded across the highway in 1912, the Anti-Tuberculosis Colony No. 1 opened with facilities for 57 patients on a 330-acre tract of land. The Tuberculosis Nursing School was founded here in 1915, and by 1961 had graduated 500 male and female nurses. The colony developed into a self-sustaining community with an average population of 2,000. Housed in 36 buildings on 992 acres of land, the institution included a post office, library, public school, power plant, dairy, vegetable garden, bakery and butcher shops. It was renamed the State Sanatorium in 1919. Most patients were in residence for nine months. At its height the Sanatorium proved a treatment capacity for 950 adults and 250 children. The institution was renamed McKnight State Tuberculosis Hospital in 1955 in honor of Dr. J. B. McKnight, superintendent from 1914 to 1950. The advent of anti-tubercular drugs and thoracic surgery altered the treatment of tuberculosis and eventually the institution closed in 1971. Fifty thousand adults and 5,000 children received treatment here. (1997)