In Edward P. Jones’ Lost in the City hospitals and facilities are a recurring motif. The first appearance of any hospital is in “The Girl Who Raised Pigeons.” Betsy Ann’s mother, Clara, spends the last month of her life living in Gallinger Municipal Hospital: “Clara spent most of the first months of her prengnancy in bed,…The last month or so she spent in the bed on the third floor at Gallinger Hospital.” (6) It is unclear whether or not Clara was admitted to Gallinger for mental illness, as Gallinger was not solely a mental institution. Even though the details are unclear, however, the reference to Gallinger is suggestive: Gallinger’s psychiatric ward was revolutionary in the normalization of mental health institutions.
Gallinger Municipal Hospital Pyschopathic Ward opened in 1923 and consisted of three buildings (Asylum Projects). The hospital was built in response to the Washington Asylum Hospital–a consolidation of a workhouse and an asylum. The treatment of patients was not significantly better at Gallinger, which deployed cruel and unusual punishments. Two investigations in 1929 and 1942 revealed the disturbing and physically harmful ways clinicians beat patients into subordination (Gifford).
Clara’s admission into Gallinger contributes to the ambiguity of her character. The lack of specification makes her seem more enigmatic both to the reader and to her daughter. Given the controversy surrounding the hospital, it is fair to speculate that Clara experienced a turbulent time within Gallinger that resulted in her death. Like Clara, Gallinger has died by the time the story takes place. In 1953, Gallinger Municipal Hospital was renamed to D.C. General Hospital (National Library of Medicine). Since its renaming, D.C. General closed as a hospital in 2001, and the space has been converted into a homeless shelter, fated to close in the fall of 2018 (Seagreaves and Swalec).
The naming clarifies a shift in generations among the characters of Lost in the City. For example, in “The Girl Who Raised Pigeons,” Clara spends the end of her life at Gallinger Hospital, while in “Gospel” Vivian and Ralph visit D.C. General weekly for Ralph’s cancer treatment. The relationship between appearance and reality is highlighted by Ralph’s treatment at D.C. General. The history of malpractice and abuse within the institution haunts D.C. General, a supposed place of healing, parallels Ralph’s own condition. Though he is handsome and seems completely healthy, his body is riddled with cancer.
Another institution, the hospital at Howard University, appears in “Gospel” and “Young Lions.” In the latter story, Caesar makes this remark: “Caesar told him no, that he had last seen Sherman in Howard Hospital” (56). Howard University Hospital originally opened in 1862 and was called Freedmen’s Hospital (Howard University Hospital). It initially offered services to freed slaves who were denied services elsewhere. Within the same decade, Freedmen’s Hospital merged with Howard University and became a part of the medical school facilities. The first African American doctor in the United States, Dr. Alexander Thomas Augusta, taught at this institution (Lloyd). Howard University Hospital remains the only teaching hospital on the campus of a historically African American institution (Howard University Hospital).
The mention of Howard Hospital in “Gospel,” reinforces the ways in which Jones shows institutional medicine obscuring the true situations of the characters; when one enters the bounds of the hospital, other characters are unaware of who is actually sick (Jones 183). The boundary between individuals and institutions fosters confusion and mystery.
A similar kind of mystery initially envelopes Lydia in “Lost in the City” when she is awakened by phone call. When Lydia answers, the woman on the phone explains how she is from George Washington University Hospital, and Lydia’s mother has passed: “‘Very well. We, the entire staff here at George Washington, are very sorry. Your mother was an exemplary patient,’ the woman said. ‘We will expect you very soon’” (141). Like Howard University Hospital, George Washington University Hospital is a teaching hospital. Initially constructed in 1948, the hospital housed the schools of nursing and medicine. In 1972, George Washington University Hospital began to offer a health sciences program. The original GWU hospital was demolished in the wake of a new hospital opening in 2002 (The George Washington University).
The George Washington employee’s news of the mother’s death offers the opposite of uncertainty. However, Lydia responding by telling her not to cover her mother’s face with a sheet reveals her unwillingness to accept that certainty, and her aimless ride around the city continues to defer confrontation with the truth of her mother’s condition.
Though typically seen as places of answers and definitive diagnoses, Jones’s use of hospitals defy the expected. In Lost in the City, hospitals are places of lost control, breakdowns of communication and care, and troubled histories. Like the dead, the hospitals of Jones’s fictions lie outside the community but influence and haunt its members.
SOURCES:
“About Howard University Hospital.” Howard University Health Care, Howard University Health Care, huhealthcare.com/healthcare/hospital/about-huh.
“Gallinger Municipal Hospital Psychopathic Ward.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 13 Mar. 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallinger_Municipal_Hospital_Psychopathic_Ward.
Gifford, Bill. “The Curse of D.C. General.” Washington City Paper, Washington City Paper, 9 Dec. 1994, 12:00, www.washingtoncitypaper.com/news/article/13009811/the-curse-of-dc-general.
“Historic Medical Sites in the Washington, DC Area – District of Columbia General Hospital.”U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, 8 Dec. 2014, www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/medtour/dcgeneral.html.
“History.” Gallinger Municipal Hospital Psychopathic Ward, Asylum Projects, www.asylumprojects.org/index.php/Gallinger_Municipal_Hospital_Psychopathic_Ward#cite_ref-1.
“History.” The School of Medicine & Health Sciences, The George Washington University, smhs.gwu.edu/about/history#16.
“History of the George Washington University.” The George Washington University, The George Washington University, 21 Oct. 2015, healthsciencesprograms.online.gwu.edu/about-us/history.
Lloyd, Sterling M. “A Short History.” Howard University College of Medicine, Howard University, June 2006, medicine.howard.edu/about-us/mission-vision-and-core-values/short-history.
Segraves, Mark, and Andrea Swalec. “DC General Homeless Shelter to Close This Year, Mayor Says.” NBC4 Washington, NBC4 Washington, 23 Jan. 2018, www.nbcwashington.com/blogs/first-read-dmv/DC-General-Homeless-Shelter-to-Close-This-Year-Mayor-Says-470595733.html.
