Early History
The organization takes its name from California pioneer John Sutter whose namesake fort was one of Sacramento’s original European settlements. In response to the influenza epidemic of 1918, community leaders constructed the first Sutter Hospital in the vicinity of the fort, replacing an old adobe house that had previously served as a makeshift hospital. Sutter Medical Center, Sacramento occupies this site today.
Other Sutter Health-affiliated hospitals date back to the 1800s and were some of Northern California’s earliest health care providers. For example, California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco was formed out of successive hospital and medical school mergers dating back to the city’s earliest days of organized medicine. In 1866, the predecessor of today’s Sutter Medical Center of Santa Rosa opened its doors to residents of Sonoma County.
Many of the health care facilities that eventually became part of the Sutter Health network were created as charitable hospitals by community members in cities coping with growing populations, epidemics, fires, floods and earthquakes.
Read more about this topic: Sutter Health
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