Avera St. Mary’s Hospital will celebrate 125 years of service to Central South Dakota on September 1, 2024.
On August 31, 1899, five Benedictine Sisters from the Sacred Heart Convent in Yankton arrived in Pierre with a combined working capital of $20 to open a school in the former abandoned Park Hotel.
The next morning local physicians approached the sisters and asked them to open a hospital instead, insisting that it was a greater need for the community and the country. They brought the first patient to the former hotel that afternoon. That was the beginning of Avera St. Mary’s Hospital.
The sisters knew little about health care, but they figured it out as they went.
The building had been abandoned for years. It was a huge undertaking to repair and clean the building to make it suitable for caring for the sick. Sister Alphonsa Linster, who was one of the first five sisters to arrive in Pierre, wrote of the experience: “What a sight. Enough to discourage the Sisters. Nothing was in the house, no beds, no dishes, no furniture. Dust, dirt and spiderwebs were the decorations.”
People of Pierre donated cots to use as initial hospital beds. They salvaged spoons, forks, knives, pitchers and plates from a pile of rubbish in the backyard. Often the sisters had to borrow money from Pierre residents to keep going and paid off their debts as quickly as possible.
With faith and determination, the sisters kept enhancing their health care ministry to meet the needs of the community.
“At one point it would not have been uncommon to find sisters holding almost every position in the hospital,” said Shantel Krebs, Regional President and CEO of Avera St. Mary’s Hospital. “For many Catholic health care systems today, you might only see sisters in executive positions, on the board or in historical photos.”
Avera St. Mary’s is unique. In July Sister Deb Nelson, PBVM, joined Avera St. Mary’s Hospital as the Vice President of Mission.
“It is exceedingly rare to have an active sister work in health care today,” said Krebs. “We are very fortunate to have Sr. Deb on campus, leading our mission formation efforts, interacting with staff and connecting our employees and those we serve to our mission.”
Today, Avera St. Mary’s employs nearly 700 people and serves approximately 600 patients each day across the Avera St. Mary’s Campus with state-of-the-art equipment in beautiful facilities.
“What makes Avera St. Mary’s unique is that we have the fortune of being driven by a set of values that flow from a religious tradition,” said Krebs. “We’re not performing for the sake of shareholders. We’re called to this work to perpetuate the healing ministry of Jesus.”
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