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The CHRISTUS Legacy
Spohn founded as Corpus Christi's first hospital
On July 25, 1905, Mother Cleophas Hurst and three Sisters from the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word of San Antonio opened Spohn Sanitarium on Corpus Christi's North Beach. At the request of Arthur Edward Spohn, M.D., the Sisters journeyed there to staff and run the city's first hospital.
Dr. Spohn, a native of Canada, settled in South Texas in 1876. Because Corpus Christi had no hospital, Dr. Spohn cared for patients in their homes and in a makeshift operating room at the Incarnate Word Convent. In 1897, he began a fundraising campaign to build a hospital in Corpus Christi. It took eight years to raise the $12,000 construction cost.
The two-story frame hospital was built on North Beach, just 100 yards from the Corpus Christi Bay. Fourteen years later, a devastating hurricane destroyed the building, killing four people, including one Sister.
Hospital supporters resumed their fundraising campaign. In 1923, a 50-bed Spohn Hospital at 1436 Third Street was dedicated. That facility is now known as CHRISTUS Spohn Hospital Shoreline. Over the years, Dr. Spohn's original efforts have spawned the CHRISTUS Spohn Health System, with six hospitals in Corpus Christi, Kingsville, Beeville, Kleberg and Alice.
For more than 100 years, CHRISTUS Spohn has remained a faith-based, value driven organization dedicated to meeting the needs of the communities it serves.
