|
About Us » History & Archives » 2007: Steel Pier » Meet the Characters of Steel Pier » Marathon Medical Staff
Marathon Medical Staff
Marathon Medical Staff: Ellsworth R. Johnson, MD & Nurse Bridget O'Reilly
About Dr. Johnson
In December of 1871, Ellsworth Rose Johnson, MD was born at home in Carbondale, Pennsylvania. He was the youngest with four older sisters and two brothers. He was educated in a one room school house on Park Street and worked in the family grocery store on the very same street until gaining admittance to the University of Scranton. While in college, he had aspirations of becoming a professional boxer; however, he was KOed in his third professional fight by the scrappy Nick “the Italian Coal Cracker”. Three days latter, he awoke in Moses Taylor Hospital to meet the love of his life – Romaine Edwards, a nursing student. Their romance led to his ever growing interest in Medicine because he was seen persistently on the patient wards and in the emergency room with “Mame”. He decided to become an orderly so that he could quit his job as a coal miner’s recorder for the Scranton Coal Company. Actually the pay was better, and he did not have to come home covered in coal dust. They planned to marry as he was applying to Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. During these times, he had some memory lapses and many frightening headaches attributed to his days as a professional boxer. On a beautiful June day in 1892 surrounded by his family and college friends, Ellsworth R. awaited the appearance of his gorgeous bride at the Crystal Lake summer home of the Johnsons. In traveling from Scranton, the love of his life, her father and mother were all lost in an accident in their new Daimler – Maybach horseless carriage at the ever dangerous curve at Heart Lake. The doctor was called but none of the family could be saved. This life altering tragedy led to the withdrawal from Society by Ellsworth R. for the next two years. Even though he was to enter Jefferson Medical College, he could not even consider the possibility without his nurse – Mame. He returned to the family grocery store performing menial delivery tasks and acquiring the taste of the “spirits” for curing his headaches. This ever increasing “taste” was apparently medicinal in nature (at least initially). Finally through the encouragement of his family, he decided to enter Jefferson in 1894. He devoted all of his energies to his training and graduated at the top of his class. However, the dark side did not disappear – the headaches continued and he did not socialize. His patients and his education drew all of his attention. He remained at Jefferson to continue his residency in Anesthesiology. How could he not, this was the institution made famous by Samuel Gross – the internationally acclaimed surgeon, who died only a few years before Ellsworth R was admitted. Following residency, he accepted a faculty position at Jefferson in 1899. However, he left abruptly after three years. He moved from one small hospital to another in New Jersey, until a position opened in 1932 at the Thomas England Hospital in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He accepted the position immediately because he was unemployed. Unfortunately, six months latter, he was unemployed once again and now bankrupt. His medical license was in jeopardy, and he was looking for any income to stabilize his degenerating lifestyle. He heard that Mr. Walker required a licensed physician to monitor the “Steel Pier” marathon dancers. It would be his “marathon” as well - His opportunity to get back in the “ring”. His chance to prove he could do it. Besides, his patients would not be asleep but energetically moving about the dance floor. He could do it. He knew he could. Most importantly, he still had his medical license. Times were tough even in the medical field. It was 1933!
About Nurse O'Reilly
Bridget O’Reilly is my name. I was the first daughter born to my parents, after two older brothers, in Belmullet, County Mayo, Ireland in 1895. At the age of 5, my parents immigrated to the United States and I was left with relatives to grow up with my cousins. It was a difficult childhood. My uncles and the neighbors in Ireland faced the hard times with numerous trips to the town pub to “medicate” their pain away. By 1910, enough money had been saved for me to travel to New York. When I arrived, I learned that my father had found work as a dancer and musician in the vaudeville theaters, including a couple shows at New York City’s Palace Theatre. Within two years of joining my parents in New York, I learned I would have a younger sister. Since the apartment was small and my father’s income would need to go to the new baby, I was on her own. I worked odd jobs to bring in money. I only got to see my father perform twice on stage. I was the only one in the family who had the desire to sing and dance, but everyone said it was no way to make a living. I saw first hand through my father’s experience in vaudeville as the jobs and paychecks shrank in the late 1920’s. One of the last happy time’s I spent with my dad was a short afternoon in the summer of 1928 at Madison Square Garden watching a dance derby. My experience of caring for my uncles back in Ireland led to my choice of going to school for nursing. I took a job at Montefiore Hospital in the Bronx, where I eventually moved from caring for terminally ill patients into the new Social Services group at the hospital. But even though the people I was caring for in this new group were younger, it was not a very happy place either. It was during these years I started smoking. After several years at the hospital, I felt depressed at how my life was headed. My limited life outside the hospital was spent in vocal support of prohibition while living in the Bronx. This did not win me any suitors among my kinsmen. I had witnessed first-hand that drinking did not help my uncles with their problems. News of my father’s death led to an emotional breakdown and being released from my job at Montefiore in late 1931. I left the Bronx in 1932 and found small jobs working down the east coast until I reached Atlantic City, New Jersey. Having spent the past year without steady income, the news of Mr. Hamilton bringing a dance marathon to the Steel Pier brought me hope. The contestants would be healthy, have hopes and dreams. It would be exciting to be among dancers, like those I admired that afternoon back in New York.
The roles of Dr. Johnson and Nurse O'Reilly will be played by Rich Miller and Elizzabeth Gill.
|
