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.
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