DR. BACON SAUNDERS

Dr. Saunders built with Dr. F. D. Thompson a drugstore and office building on the North East corner of Ninth and Houston before he built the Flatiron Building. It had two stories and was also completely modern "with electricity and hot and cold water in each office". The "plate glass alone cost $1,000.00 and the building cost $20,000". Later, Dr. Saunders sold it for $50,000.

There is another notice from an early paper stating that he bought the very first electric coupe to be brought to Fort Worth. He went East to see these machines and ordered through R. R. Webb the very finest and best equipped electric car made - "a Studebaker" from the South Bend factory.

Dr. Saunders, B.A., M.D., L.L.D., D.Sc., F.A.C.S. was also instrumental in carrying through arrangements for the building of the joint City and County Hospital, later called John Peter Smith Hospital.

The demands on his time became so heavy that he had to limit his practice entirely to surgery. He made medical history when he performed the first appendectomy in the Southwest on a kitchen table in a farm house in 1879. He also performed the first abdominal surgery of any kind in the Southwest when a young man was bleeding to death from a stab wound. He opened the abdomen and stopped the bleeding. (Tarrant County Medical Bulletin, April 1929.)

His fame as a surgeon spread and he became Chief of Staff at Saint Joseph Hospital, where he was Chief Surgeon for twenty years, until his death. In 1896, he was the prime mover behind construction of a new Saint Joseph Hospital, where he and his son, Dr. Ray F. Saunders, did all their operations in a six room suite with what was then very modern equipment. Until recent years, I had a very large mirror which hung over the operating table, so that visiting doctors who came to learn new techniques could watch what was taking place during the operation, as they sat in circular raised rows of seats around the room. Dr. Saunders was founder and Dean of the School of Nursing, believed to be the first of its kind in Texas. When my father, Dr. Ray Saunders died, Mother Superior told me that they were still using books my grandfather had written for the student nurses. So many of his concepts were that lasting.

He was Chief Surgeon- for the Fort Worth and Denver for 25 years. He was also Chief Surgeon for the Wichita Valley and Trinity and Brazos Valley Railroads. He was Division and local surgeon for the Texas and Pacific International and Great Northern, St. Louis and Southwestern Railway, and the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railroads. This work of his did more to promote the growth of Saint Joseph Hospital than anything else and made of it a hospital center for railroads. He established the Fort Worth Medical College in l894 and was its Dean. In 1911-l912 it became a department of Texas Christian

University, where he was Professor of Surgery and Clinical Surgery, as well as President of the Faculty. He was also a member of the Board of Trustees at T.C.U. Later, the Medical School became a part of Baylor Medical School in 1914 and he taught there until his death.

He helped organize the North Texas Medical Association and became its first President. He was President of the Texas Medical Association. He was Vice President of the International Surgical Association. He was founder and Second President of the Texas Surgical Association. He was a member of American Medical Association and was one of the first to be made a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons. One of his greatest honors was when he was made President of the exclusive Southern Surgical and Gynecological Association, whose membership is limited to the 200 leading surgeons of the U.S. At the age of six, my grandfather began taking me every year to these meetings for two weeks in the cities and famous resorts in the east, where I was privileged to meet all the great men of this profession, at that time, the Mayor, Dr. Ochsner Holstead. His election to President of this association brought such publicity and prestige to Fort Worth that a banquet was given here in his honor. Men came from all parts of the state and congratulatory telegrams from allover the world. He was the first Texas to have this office and honor.

He was a Director of the Farmer's and Merchants Bank (now Fort Worth National). He was an Elder in the First Christian Church and laid the cornerstone of that Building, which is still standing at Sixth and Throckmorton streets. He was an active member of the Chamber of Commerce, where he served on several committees.

He was not only a noted pioneer surgeon and teacher, but a man who was interested in every phase of Fort Worth's life and gave generously of his time, effort and money to his city.
 

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