History

Honoring Our Past

It All Began with One Woman’s Vision
Everything began by the vision of one remarkable woman by the name of Henrietta Cleveland. Despite the incredible personal loss she endured with the death of her husband and two children, Ms. Cleveland managed to found the hospital in 1861. 

Concerned with the plight of Covington’s poor, Ms. Cleveland petitioned the Diocese of Covington’s first bishop, the Most Rev. George Carrell, about the need for a hospital in Northern Kentucky to care for the less fortunate. After gaining the bishop’s approval, she enlisted the help of a wealthy Cincinnati social activist, Sarah Worthington King Peter, to raise more than $2,000 to help build the hospital.

The civic-minded pair then recruited the Franciscan Sisters of the Poor to staff the hospital and open a home for foundlings – infants who had been abandoned. The nuns worked with Ms. Cleveland, and the ladies of the first St. Elizabeth Support Guild, to raise the funds needed to purchase a building on 7th Street, which soon became the hospital which they named after St. Elizabeth of Hungary. The first St. Elizabeth Hospital opened its doors on January 23, 1861 and 78 patients were admitted in its first year.

Growth Rooted in Commitment to Mission
The demand for services from that fledgling organization grew swiftly, and over the next 53 years, the sisters would have to move twice to acquire larger facilities to treat those in need. In fact, by 1914 St. Elizabeth opened its new facility on 21st Street in Covington that many knew as the St. Elizabeth North Unit.

Then, in 1948, the citizens of Campbell County began to realize that they, too, had a dire need for a hospital in their growing area. That’s when residents passed a bond issue to build what we now know as St. Elizabeth Ft. Thomas. Within five years, the new Grand Avenue facility opened with 128 beds. Less than 10 years later, two more floors were added, followed by intensive and coronary care units in the early 1970s.

As Northern Kentucky’s population continued to soar and expand to other areas within the region, St. Elizabeth responded by opening its Edgewood facility with 182 beds in 1978. Today, the Edgewood facility has grown to 502 beds and serves as the flagship location for St. Elizabeth Healthcare.

Meanwhile, burgeoning growth in Boone County made clear the need for a state-of-the-art medical facility in that area as well. In 1979, the hospital we now call St. Elizabeth Florence opened in Boone County’s largest city in order to serve the increasing population of the area.

As these facilities grew and added space and specialty services, the need for healthcare in Northern Kentucky’s more rural areas became more evident. Again St. Elizabeth responded to the need. In 1980, a Pendleton County hospital was purchased, which is now known as St. Elizabeth Falmouth, Northern Kentucky’s only inpatient drug and alcohol treatment center. Then, 10 years later, we began managing the facility now known as St. Elizabeth Grant, in Williamstown.

In late 2008, St. Elizabeth Medical Center and the St. Luke Hospitals joined to form what we now know as St. Elizabeth Healthcare. Today, our thriving, healthcare system is not only a regional healthcare leader, but is poised to become a national leader, as well.