Looking Back -- A first duo of doctors

NEWPORT BEACH -- Before Hoag Hospital opened its doors to Newport

Beach residents and their neighbors, two men took on the first medical

load during a time when epidemics like influenza hit home.

Dr. Conrad Richter arrived to the city first. He was a doctor on a

German ship who stayed in California when his ship docked here in 1917.

Judge Robert Gardner’s book “Bawdy Balboa” fondly and brutally honestly

says Richter was “one of the grand old men of Balboa,” but not

necessarily because of his medical skills.

When influenza spread in Newport Beach almost immediately after

Richter’s arrival, he shopped for a residential doctor to help him heal

the masses.

That’s when Dr. Gordon M. Grundy arrived in Newport Beach and settled

here after serving as a doctor in World War I.

Jim Felton’s “Newport Beach, The First Century” tells us “The two

doctors treated every flu case and halted the epidemic with only one

death.”

Gardner’s book says Grundy was an excellent doctor.

Richter, with a German accent that Gardner endearingly imitated in

writing, continued to treat residents through the decades in his

non-business savvy sort of way.

“Dr. Richter was also very, very famous over at the Newport Harbor

Yacht Club,” said George Grupe, a historian and longtime resident of

Newport Beach. “He was a sailor in the early days... And Richter smoked

big cigars.”

Grundy was also affiliated with the yacht club, according to Felton’s

Book, but as a resident.

As a bachelor, he apparently lived in a guest room there and climbed

out the window late at night when he needed to go treat someone because

he didn’t want to wake the neighbors.

Grundy continued to open offices in the city, including one on Balboa

Peninsula, and finally opened Newport’s first hospital in 1927. It was

located at the intersection of Central Avenue (now Balboa Boulevard) and

9th Street, Felton’s book says.Grupe said Grundy and Richter worked

together at this first hospital, which he remembers being a little brick

building.

It housed many rooms -- one for operating, one for delivery, several

for general treatments and offices plus one for a kitchen. Grundy’s wife

often cooked the meals there, Felton’s books says.

“Most everybody went to Dr. Grundy because Dr. Richter was older,”

Grupe said.

* Do you know of a person, place or event that deserves a historical

Look Back? Let us know. Contact Young Chang by fax at (949) 646-4170;

e-mail at o7 young.chang@latimes.comf7 ; or mail her at c/o Daily

Pilot, 330 W. Bay St., Costa Mesa, CA 92627.