Adventures at the Museum: January 2020

Ft. Defiance Hospital Arizona 1937

Construction of the Fort Defiance Indian Hospital marked a major step on the part of the Office of Indian Affairs to improve health conditions and medical services across the entire Navajo Reservation through the establishment of a complete-service base hospital offering consultation for doctors at other reservation hospitals.

Secondly, it also marked a significant step in the articulation of a distinct institutional building style on the Navajo Reservation. Using the plans provided by Office of Indian Affairs architect Hans Stamm, local craftsman using local stone developed a local, Navajo-inspired elaboration of the Pueblo Revival Style, one that fulfilled Commissioner of Indian Affairs John Collier's policy that government buildings should reflect a style sensitive to the architectural heritage of the people they would serve. The complex is historically significant for bringing modern health practices and medicine to the Navajo Tribe and as evidence of the Commissioner's efforts to recognize tribal ethnic heritage through the style given to the building.

The old hospital opened in 1938 with 153 patients already checked in since construction finished at that time. It was used continuously as a hospital until 2005. The Fort Defiance Indian Hospital served as the main hospital on the Navajo Reservation until a new 200-bed medical center opened at Gallup in 1961. The Fort Defiance Indian Hospital gradually became outdated by the late 1990s. It was replaced by a new hospital in Fort Defiance which opened in 2002 and the 1938 building was vacant from 2005 until its unfortunate demolition sometime between 2011 and 2015. By January of 2017 it was gone.

The site, directly across from the then-existing hospital along Bonito Drive and within easy walking distance staff quarters and other support facilities, was chosen as an efficient, cost-effective alternative to several other sites favored by the architect. Lying within the valley formed by Bonito Creek, at the foot of a sandstone mesa, the site also provided some protection from wind and dust storms.

The three-story, roughly H-shaped floor plan fitted neatly onto the relatively narrow site, stretching along a north-south axis, between the base of the mesa to the east and Bonito Drive to the west. Public entrances were on the west, or street-side of the building, and utility uses were relegated to the rear, mesa side and were accessed via a driveway encircling the building.

The exterior walls, comprised of large, irregular red sandstone blocks, quarried locally and artfully shaped and fitted by Navajo stonemasons, were intended to evoke the surrounding landscape and traditional building techniques. Regularly spaced, rectangular openings with massive sandstone headers, provided most of the exterior detail. The building had a solid, timeless and utilitarian appearance that remained largely unchanged over the decades.

Beginning of erection of steel on Ft. Defiance Hospital

View of Ft. Defiance Hospital from atop mountain at rear. 1938

Ft. Defiance Hospital 1937

Brian Ball of Texas recently sent an envelope of photos that belonged to his father, Robert Claud Ball, who worked construction on the hospital in the 1930's to the Apache County Historical Society. Some of those photos are included in this post. The rest will be uploaded to our Facebook page and possibly another collection online.