MONROE COUNTY HISTORIC PHOTO ALBUM
Society
When there’s a need,
there’s a person or a group in Monroe County who can fill
it, it seems.
High schools many years ago listed as a priority “the
worthy use of leisure time.” For many, that translates into
membership in a myriad of social and civic organizations
that have assisted the needy, changed politics, built
medical facilities and churches, bettered our schools,
preserved our history, helped our children, entertained us
with music and arts and generally improved our communities.
Their purposes often overlapped. During World War II, for
instance, Red Cross and the Stroudsburg Women’s Club worked
together to present nutritional programs at the YMCA.
Volunteer emergency medical aides were trained at the Civil
Liberties Union (C.L.U.) Club in East Stroudsburg. The
Kiwanis salvaged rubber and scrap iron and promoted Victory
Gardens to help with rationing efforts.
The Monroe County Hospital was started in 1906 by eight men
in the George Heller home on Sarah Street in Stroudsburg.
The General Hospital was started in 1915 on North Courtland
Street in a location now occupied by the East Stroudsburg
United Methodist Church. It moved to the present site of
the Pocono Medical Center on East Brown Street and in 1930
merged with the Monroe County Hospital. Many of its
facilities have been financed over the years through
donations and charitable work.
Civic pride drew volunteers to fight fires or to dedicate
careers to emergency services, police work or other vital
services such as rounding up horse thieves. The Phoenix
Fire Engine and Hose Company #2 of Stroudsburg was the
first, formed on September 26, 1845. Likewise, the military
appealed to the loyalties of Monroe County residents who
have fought for their country since the Revolutionary War.
They’ve helped in other ways, too: vaccines produced by Dr.
Richard Slee in Swiftwater – at what is now Aventis
Pasteur* – were shipped to Cuba in 1898 to assist soldiers
who were stricken by disease in the Spanish American War.
* Update: Now named
Sanofi Pasteur.