The following memories and stories about the Maitland Hospital emerged from background research, and from being shared by artists, staff, volunteers, patients and community members.
Nurse Finney.
Nancy Finney’s daughters share photographs and memories about their Mum’s training and work as a nurse at Maitland Hospital from 1933 to 1944.
Maternity, birthing and special care 2021.
Catharine Neilson photographs of the Maternity, Birthing and Special Care Units taken during 2021.
Imaging prints.
Mid-twentieth century images of the hospital printed from old photoengraving blocks, and now hanging in the Imaging wait area of the new Maitland Hospital.
First matron.
Susan O’Doherty’s textile sculpture of Maitland Hospital’s first matron, Elizabeth Morrow, is the core of a display in the new Maitland Hospital about Morrow and what she represents in the history of nursing at the hospital and elsewhere.
Hospital staff.
Adrian Lockhart’s painting ‘Hospital staff’ and a small collection of items are displayed in the new Maitland Hospital in honour of the staff who, in their many and varied roles, have provided health care throughout the history of the hospital.
A new timeline.
The timeline created for the opening of the New Maitland Hospital in January 2022.
The smell of porridge.
Paediatrician Keith Howard shares his memories of working in the children’s ward at Maitland Hospital from the late 1970s to 2014.
Nurses’ reunions.
Photographs and albums created at and for reunions of Maitland nurses, and now in the custody of former Maitland nurse Lynette Huckstadt.
The way we were.
A timeline for the history of nursing and nurse education at Maitland Hospital.
Three generations.
Tom Healy on his family’s association with The Maitland Hospital over three generations.
Later she married a widower.
Jennie Lawrence and her work as a community nurse in the early twentieth century.
Stitched together.
Susan O’Doherty’s textile sculptures stitch together the stories of women working at The Maitland Hospital over time. Her sculptures are in the exhibition A Conspicuous Object at the Maitland Regional Art Gallery.
A royal wedding.
Anne McDonald shares a photograph and memories of the hospital’s Surgical Unit staff celebrating the 2018 royal wedding.
An ambulance, a patient and a nurse.
Anne McDonald recalls a memorable ambulance trip from Maitland Hospital to Sydney in 1984.
You could hear the cows mooing.
Christine Thompson remembers the saleyards opposite the nurses’ residence, and triggers other memories and details.
Graduate nurses - names please!
An invitation to assist with identifying people in photographs of graduate nurses at The Maitland Hospital.
Long hard hours.
Leanne Debenham shares her fond memories of the stories her grandmother, Muriel Morris, told about training and working at The Maitland Hospital.
Titillating stories.
Remembering the first nurses’ residence at The Maitland Hospital. It was built in the late 1920s and demolished in 1993 to make way for new hospital buildings.