DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker on Leland Avenue tells it, and I'm gonna do it justice. Picture Dallas, somewhere around 1920. A woman named Martha Schultze — registered nurse, twelve years of private duty work and hospital floors already behind her — decides she's done working for somebody else's institution.
She opens Good Samaritan Hospital right here on Leland Avenue. Now, Martha didn't learn her craft in Texas. She trained in Germany, her native country, before she ever set foot in the United States.
So she brought the old world's discipline across the ocean and put it to work in a growing city that needed exactly that. Her husband Ernest was right there alongside her, running a clinical laboratory associated with the facility. This was a family operation in every sense of the word.
When Good Samaritan first opened its doors, the staff specialized in maternity services. And let me tell you, hundreds of children came into this world under that roof. Hundreds.
By 1933, the building had grown — enlargements, additions, a full operating room — and just like that, the hospital could offer general services too. Staff included registered nurses, student nurses, and other aides. But here's the thing that makes this story worth tellin' on a stretch of Texas highway: Good Samaritan Hospital treated the elderly, the infirm, and those who could not afford to pay.
The neighborhood around Leland Avenue, regardless of income or status — those were Martha Schultze's people. Every last one of them. She ran that hospital for every single year it operated, right up until it closed in 1945.
Twenty-five years, give or take, on that one piece of ground. Martha Schultze died in 1966, but long before that, she had already built something that outlasted any building. Today, that hospital is still remembered as a place that never turned a neighbor away.
A German immigrant, a registered nurse, a woman with twelve years of hard-earned experience and a whole lot of heart — she built it, she ran it, and Dallas is still sayin' her name.
What the marker says
The Good Samaritan Hospital served Dallas residents at this location on Leland Avenue for approximately 25 years. Martha Schultze, a registered nurse, opened the facility c. 1920. Schultze received nursing training in her native country, Germany, before immigrating to the United States. She worked in private duty nursing and in hospitals for twelve years before opening Good Samaritan Hospital. Her husband, Ernest, operated a clinical laboratory here which was associated with the facility. When Good Samaritan Hospital opened, staff specialized in maternity services. By 1933, enlargement of and additions to the building, which included an operating room, allowed for the hospital to also offer general services. Staff consisted of registered nurses, student nurses and other aides. Good Samaritan Hospital offered medical treatment to residents throughout the neighborhood, including the elderly, the infirm and those who were unable to afford payment. Good Samaritan Hospital closed in 1945. Martha Schultze, who died in 1966, ran the facility for the entirety of its operating years. Today, it continues to be remembered as a facility that served residents of the area regardless of income or status. Hundreds of children were born in Good Samaritan Hospital, which, through the enterprising efforts of a German immigrant, treated those in need in the growing city of Dallas. (2008)