DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Now, before we talk about Dr. Boyd Cornick, let's just acknowledge what doctors were handing tuberculosis patients back in the early 1900s — hot cane juice, honey with wine, and arsenic.
Arsenic. You'd almost rather take your chances with the disease. But Cornick, he'd been there.
He'd had tuberculosis himself, that often-fatal disease, and he'd come out the other side. And what he learned from that fight changed things in a big way. He found that rest, a dry warm climate, and proper diet could actually work — could actually cure people — and he staked his career on that idea.
In 1907, right here in Tom Green County, he built thirty cottages. Thirty. Not one experimental cabin, not a small trial — thirty full bungalows, ready to receive patients coming in from all over the United States.
People were making the journey from every corner of the country to this spot in West Texas, chasing the same dry warm air that had helped Cornick himself. Then, about 1910, he went even further. He drew up Texas' first sanitary code.
The first one. And if that wasn't enough, he later influenced the building of the very first State Tuberculosis Sanitarium, out at Carlsbad, Texas. A man who survived the disease, ditched the arsenic, built thirty cottages, and helped reshape how an entire state handled public health.
That marker's been standing since 1968 — and the story it marks is something else.
What the marker says
In 1907 Dr. Boyd Cornick built 30 cottages here as part of his pioneer efforts in treatment of tuberculosis. Having previously recovered from the often-fatal disease, Cornick found that rest, a dry, warm, climate, and proper diet were an effective cure. These new methods replaced common treatments of the day, including hot cane juice, honey with wine, and arsenic. Patients came here from all over the U.S. About 1910 Cornick drew up Texas' first sanitary code and later influenced the building of the first State Tuberculosis Sanitarium at Carlsbad, Texas. (1968)