Cure Cottages of Saranac Lake - During The World Wars

During The World Wars

World War I caused another major increase in patients— the stress of war and the damage caused by mustard gas provided fertile ground for the tuberculosis bacillus. By 1921 there were 650 veterans living in Saranac Lake; later, the Veterans Administration opened Sunmount Veterans Hospital in nearby Tupper Lake.

When Norway was overrun by the Nazis early in World War II, many Norwegian merchant seamen who were at sea at the time chose to come to the United States; some of those were found to have tuberculosis, and perhaps as many as 500 came to live in Saranac Lake. They nearly all left after the war, but 16 had died, and are buried in a special section of Pine Ridge Cemetery; their graves are tended by prisoners at nearby Camp Gabriels, funded by an annual payment from the Norwegian government.