In 1933, the Ragland family opened the first full-time hospital in Upshur County. Thomas Scott Ragland, M.D. (1872 - 1936) came to Texas in 1895; he settled in Gilmer in 1902 with his wife, Mamie Helen (Denson). In addition to serving as the community physician, Ragland was a local surgeon for railroads, a businessman, and president of First National Bank. He worked together with his two sons, Madison Scott (1905 - 1986) and Hugh Mayo Ragland (1907 - 1966), who joined his practice after they finished their medical training. In 1933, the doctors purchased property on Cass Street and built a hospital and clinic to serve Gilmer and the surrounding areas.
The Ragland Clinic-Hospital expanded several times. The first expansion (1935) included nine additional hospital rooms and beds. In the second (1946), the Raglands added a new north wing with upstairs rooms, a dietary kitchen and a pharmacy. A 1953 expansion added more bedrooms and treatment facilities, and the final one (1957) increased in-room patient capacity and added a doctors' office wing. Additional staff joined through the years, including Drs. J. Looney Fenlaw
(1912 - 1992) and Tedroe J. Ford (1928 - 1980). The institution changed names to Ragland-Fenlaw Clinic-Hospital and then to Ragland-Fenlaw-Ford clinic and Gilmer Hospital to reflect the additional physicians. Besides directly serving patients, the institution created a successful licensed vocation nursing program to address the critical shortage of nurse retention during World War II. The institution continued to serve as the only general medical facility in Upshur County until it closed in 1981, when a new regional medical center opened.
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