Arroyo del Valle Tuberculosis Sanitarium (ruins)

USA / California / Livermore /
Before the advent of antibiotics and the understanding of germ theory, the contagious disease tuberculosis, or consumption, was a significant killer of people of all ages. In 1900 the major cause of mortality in San Francisco was tuberculosis, the cause of 1,132 deaths. Heart disease was second with 619 deaths. Alameda County opened a sanitarium for tuberculosis cases on 258 acres in the foothills along the Arroyo Del Valle in February 1918. Named Arroyo Sanitarium, the hospital was five miles south of Livermore in an open woodland area.

The Livermore Valley climate is drier than portions of Alameda County closer to the bay. This was considered good for TB patients. At this time, the treatment for TB was bed rest and open air.

By 1922 there were 60 staff members and 175 patients at Arroyo, including 40 children. The greater majority of the patients were non-paying. Paying patients were only admitted if there was no waiting list. For paying clients, the cost was $75 per month.

Even those adults who were bed patients worked at occupational therapy. As their health improved, they had extended activities in occupational therapy or enrolled in industrial training classes, for example printing, sewing, barbering, or wireless radio. They were also encouraged to take correspondence courses in such diverse subjects as English, salesmanship, journalism, and bookkeeping.

The last patient left the Arroyo Sanitarium on August 23, 1960. In its 42 years it had cared for more than 10,000 patients.

The buildings lay vacant for many years. The movie Warlock Moon was filmed on the site. Finally, the county assigned the property with its crumbling buildings to the East Bay Regional Park District.

In 1998 the Taylor Family Foundation (TTFF), a private non-profit organization, partnered with the park district to plan Camp Arroyo on the remaining 138-acre sanitarium property. Construction began in September 1999 with the destruction and clearing of most of the old building remnants. A new dining hall, swim complex, and 12 cabins were completed by the spring of 2001.

Many of the sanitarium building foundations remain.

1950 Time article about tuberculosis treatment:
www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,780201,00.htm...

Further reading:
www.livermorehistory.com/Archive%20-%20Newspapers/2006-...
Nearby cities:
Coordinates:   37°37'2"N   121°45'13"W

Comments

  • 2nd photo is a watercolor of the Arroyo del Valle Tuberculosis Sanitarium (also known as Alameda County Tuberculosis Sanitarium) by architect Henry H. Meyers. Meyers (1867-1943) was an Alameda County native and designed over 200 buildings in the San Francisco Bay Area, Northern California, Hawaii, and Guam.
  • I was at Del Valle Farm in 1936 and 1937 for 1 year. I was 5 1/2 years old when I got there. I was put in isolation in a small room for a couple of weeks to be observed about how my tuberculosis was. From there I was moved into a ward with about 10 beds and we wore brown shirts brown shorts and brown sandals and brown sweaters. MY age group had no schooling, we had a milk break at 10 in the morning and then took a nap at 2 in the afternoon for 1 hour. Visiting day was on sunday my Mother and Father came to visit me my Mother was so upset crying and screaming that they didn't allow her to come back again. I was released February 18th 1937. They had sent a post card to my Mother stating that I was ready to go home bring appropriate clothing and that information had been sent on penny postcard. When some of the children became very ill they were moved up the hill to the hospital sanitarium also at the hospital were other people that were dying of tuberculosis, there were no antibiotics or no cure for TB at that time. Sometimes we would visit the hospital, and say hello to the patients but were not allowed to go into the rooms but just stand by the door. Eventually the hospital became a military hospital during world war 2. We had guinea pigs and an empty swimming pool and on sunday mornings we had sunday school and sang onward christian soldiers. When I got out, I had to spend 6 more months in the house at home and then started school 7 years old.
  • Your mother must have been devastated to leave you there. Not really knowing if you were going to be cured or maybe die. Was it a scary place to you as a child ?
This article was last modified 13 years ago