Waverly Sanitorium

The land that Waverly Hills sits on, was purchased by Major Thomas H. Hays in 1883. Major Hays needed a school for his daughters to go to, so he started a one room school house down on pages lane and hired a woman whose name was Lizzie Lee Harris as the teacher.

The building began as a two-story frame building, construction on this building began in 1908, and it opened on July 26, 1910. This building was only designed to safely accommodate 40-50 tuberculosis patients. Tuberculosis was a very serious disease back before antibiotics were discovered. People who were afflicted with tuberculosis had to be isolated from the general public and placed in an area where they could rest, stay calm, and have plenty of fresh air. Sanatoriums were built on high hills surrounded by peaceful woods to create a serene atmosphere to help the patients recover.

One of the more popular, well known aspect of Waverly is the "bodychute". It was once used to transport the bodies of deceased TB patients from the hospital to the bottom of the hill. At the peak of the epidemic, many patients died. So that the doctors and nurses could keep morale up and not upset living patients, the dead were taken out the Body Chute to discretely send bodies away from the hill.

I have a slide show below with pictures from Waverly and I also have some VERY interesting still pictures. If you would like to view those pictures please click Here