A Common Need

A History of Medical Care on Whidbey Island

As part of our 30th anniversary celebration, our Board of Commissioners contracted with a local historian, Theresa Trebon, to write a book about the history of health care on Whidbey Island and the history of Whidbey General Hospital.

"A Common Need" 
can be purchased for $23.00 from Trish Rose in  Community Relations  678-7656 ext 3350, or 321-7656 ext 3350. The book is also available in the hospital Gift Shop.

Chapter One - "The Greatest of Human Blessings"

A Wise man should consider that health is the greatest of human blessings.
- Hippocrates

Going West. Those who undertook that perilous journey in the 1850's hoped that the opportunity at trail's end outweighed the risks inherent in the crossing. Many who came to Oregon Territory did so because of the Donation Land Claim Act. The 1850 congressional legislation guaranteed individuals three hundred and twenty acres of Oregon land, or six hundred and forty if they were married, provided they stay on the property and cultivated it for four years. The chance to obtain free land brought Whidbey Island its first permanent white settlers beginning with Isaac Ebey of Missouri. Just two weeks after the law was passed, Ebey carved out his claim from some of Whidbey's richest land: a flat, fertile prairie with an incomparable salt-water landing in the center of the island.

But while free land was a potent lure, another, more compelling reason drew settlers west: the notion of a healthier place to live. First explorers, and then settlers, promoted the image of a "hale and hearty West" in their letters to family and friends located primarily in the Midwest. They urged loved ones to follow them to this land of physical beneficence, of milder winters and summers. But nothing gave a more legitimate stamp to the impression of a "healthier" land than the newspapers that sprang up in the wake of white settlement. By 1852, the hamlet of Olympia had the Columbian to spout the region's charms, and health led its list of local attributes:

The Columbian, November 6, 1852
"We live not only in a healthy atmosphere -- free from all contagion or local diseases, but in a sort of natural, self acting hospital, in which those who may seek a home in it, albeit bringing infection with them from abroad, will be speedily restored to renewed animation, life and vigor."

The notion of a "self-acting" hospital appealed to many, particularly the Ebey family of Adair County, Missouri. Isaac was the first to come west. In 1848 he headed for California, leaving behind his wife Rebecca, their two sons, his parents, Jacob and Sarah Ebey, and his siblings. Sarah Ebey could offer ample testimony to the toll extracted by sickness and unhealthy conditions. Between 1816 and 1831 she gave birth to twelve children, six of whom were dead by the time Isaac departed for California. In 1849 she lost her twenty-year old son to tuberculosis, and two years later, the same disease took her daughter as well. The death of Sarah Ebey Turner, age twenty-six, proved the impetus for her parents and remaining siblings to head for the Puget Sound country. When they embarked on the Oregon Trail, Jacob and Sarah Ebey were both in their late-fifties, an age considered "old" by the standard of the mid-nineteenth century. Their willingness to undertake such a journey near the end of their lives speaks to the Ebey family's determination to live in a "healthier" place. It was a determination which permeated the following letter from Winfield Ebey to his brother Isaac in Washington, one in which he informs Isaac of their sister's death from tuberculosis:

July 9, 1851
"My Dear Brother,
It is with sad heart that I inform you of our very heavy and heartrending misfortune. Our beloved and affectionate sister Sarah is no more. She departed this life for immortal happiness last Sunday morning at 4:00...After her violent attack of hemorrhage last spring, she got able to return to Winchester where they live and appeared to be getting better for some time; But she was taken in a short time with a violent bronchitis of the lung which brought her to the verge of the grave."

"It is still my determination to go to Oregon next spring if possible... It is evident to me that this country is not suitable for our family. I have witnessed the deaths of our family until my heart has grown sick with this place. I believe that the disease of (our brother and sister) is more powerful in Missouri than almost any other place owing the many sudden changes of the climate from very warm to the most intense cold in a short time."

But while the West offered promises of health, one had to get there first and the going was not easy. The trip bore little resemblance to the "Wagon Trains" presented in twentieth century entertainment. Accidents joined with unsanitary conditions, poor water, and inadequate medical care to take the lives of many who embarked on the Oregon Trail. In 1851, as his wife and sons prepared to join that year's "emigration," Isaac Ebey wrote Rebecca a twelve page letter advising her on what lay ahead. After telling what provisions to bring, and when to start, Isaac concluded his letter with the following admonitions which he underlined twice, his way of impressing upon his family the enormity of what lay ahead:

June 8, 1851
"Drive every day, never camp two nights on the same ground, avoid old camp grounds or where others have camped as much as possible in this way many contagious diseases are avoided."

If emigrants thought the trail's danger had been exaggerated, the countless graves bordering the route quickly made them believers. Cholera was one of the fiercest killers, a result of drinking water becoming infected with bacteria. Although no one understood exactly how the disease infiltrated wagon trains, Isaac Ebey was right to warn his wife to avoid "old camp grounds" where human and animal waste tainted water supplies. His warnings paid off: Rebecca and her sons made it to Oregon without incident. Others heading to Whidbey were not so fortunate. The year after Rebecca left, her mother Harriet set out on the trail to join her accompanied by Rebecca's two brothers. En route she died of some mysterious illness and was buried "on the plains.".................

Read the rest of chapter one as well the remainder of : "A Common Need" available through Community Relations or the Gift Shop