The History of OSF Saint Francis
Starting as a humble 35-bed hospital, OSF HealthCare Saint Francis Medical Center has continuously evolved into a leading facility known for its innovative care and commitment to serving the community with the greatest care and love. It has been a cornerstone of health care in Peoria, Illinois, since 1876 by The Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis, which officially became a new religious community in 1877.
Establishing a New Community
1876: Six Sisters arrived from Iowa City, Iowa, to start a hospital in a rented three-story house at 708 S. Adams St., Peoria, Illinois.
July 16, 1877: Sister M. Frances Krasse was elected the first Mother General of the newly formed order, The Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis.
1877: 248 Bluff St., the Underhill mansion, was acquired with the help of Bishop John Lancaster Spalding.
Late 1800s
1878: After a $10,500 renovation and expansion, the Sisters opened the Underhill property as a 35-patient bed hospital, known as St. Francis Hospital.
1885: Construction began for a north wing that increased the number of patient beds to 53, and included a chapel and rooms for the Sisters.
October 28, 1885: Mother M. Frances Krasse, O.S.F., passed away with her Sisters gathered around. Her last words to her Sisters were: “Dear Sisters, keep yourselves in strict accord and obedience. Nurse the sick with the greatest care and love, then God’s blessing be with you.”
Early 1900s
1902: Bishop John Lancaster Spalding blessed a new $120,000 addition brought the capacity to 190 with two operating rooms and an emergency room.
1905: St. Francis Hospital Training School in Peoria was established with Sister M. Bernardine Krampe, O.S.F., serving as the first superintendent.
1909: St. Francis Hospital X-ray laboratory was established.
1909: The newly built chapel at St. Francis Hospital was blessed by Bishop Edmund Michael Dunne, followed by a special Mass said by Father Bernard Baak.
1918: The newly completed “A Building” was dedicated and blessed. The addition added 97 beds and a hydro-electro therapy area.
1919: A mobile Victor Bedside Unit was acquired, allowing for radiographing images to be taken of patients who are too ill to be removed from their beds.
1924: 150 Sisters, 50 nurses and 125 physicians, surgeons and dentists provided care and service at St. Francis Hospital.
1930s
1930: The new St. Francis Convent was blessed by Bishop Joseph H. Schlarman. The new building provided accommodation for 400 Sisters and released 60 additional hospital beds that were put into use for a pediatric unit.
1931: The St. Francis Hospital School of Anesthesia was established with Sister M. Borromea Suplicka, O.S.F., serving as superintendent.
1934: A separate pediatric department was established.
1935: 10,000 charity lunches were distributed at the kitchen door.
1937: The new St. Francis Hospital School of Nursing was completed. The new nurses’ home was built to house up to 250 students.
1938: Peoria’s first iron lung was put to work at St. Francis Hospital.
1940s
1942: The new eight-story B Building was dedicated, making the hospital a 500-bed facility.
1942: The Premature Station, better known as the “dollhouse” was established.
1943: The St. Francis Community Clinic opened.
1944: St. Francis Hospital was identified as one of 1,030 hospitals in the U.S. to serve as a distribution point for the new drug, penicillin.
1945: St. Francis Hospital introduced a new photo-fluorographic unit, the first in the state. Provided by the Peoria County Tuberculosis Association, the unit was able to identify active cases of tuberculosis from X-rays.
1946: St. Francis Hospital became the first hospital in Illinois and the third in the nation to be equipped with a system that supplied oxygen to every room in the hospital.
1947: A group from the Southern Educational Film Service filmed “The Starting Line” documentary about cutting-edge premature infant care featuring the Premature Station at St. Francis Hospital.
1950s
1950: The newly completed Forest Park Home was blessed. The facility was created to care for chronically ill patients.
1951: The life of a 3-month-old baby was saved after a rare double aorta heart surgery. The infant was the youngest patient to undergo this type of surgery.
1954: Bishop Cousins blessed the new 100-bed St. Francis Children’s Hospital.
1954: The St. Francis Community Clinic moved to the ground floor of the newly built Children’s Hospital building.
1959: St. Francis Hospital received its first accreditation from the Joint Commissions on Accreditation of Hospitals.
1960s
1960: Sister M. Canisia Gerlach, O.S.F., was appointed administrator.
1960: An intensive care unit was opened.
1964: A Meals on Wheels program was established to provide meals for community members unable to cook for themselves.
1965: A new Hospital Information System by IBM was demonstrated at St. Francis Hospital, marking the first demonstration given within a hospital in the U.S.
1966: A new premature center opened.
1967: A Journal Star helicopter was used to transport a premature baby to St. Francis Hospital.
1968: The Center Building addition – a $10.5 million project – was opened, bringing the capacity to 800.
1969: A Centrex telephone system was installed. Each phone in the hospital had a direct phone number, making the switchboard obsolete. St. Francis Hospital was one of the first facilities in the nation to have this modern system.
1969: A cardiac catheterization lab was established under the direction of Dr. William Albers.
1970s
1970: A southside mobile clinic was established as an extension of the St. Francis Community Clinic.
1971: St. Francis Hospital and the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria signed an affiliation agreement.
1971: St. Francis Hospital was designated as a regional trauma center.
1973: The first open-heart surgery in Peoria was performed at St. Francis Hospital.
1974: St. Francis Hospital added “Medical Center” to its name.
1974: St. Francis Hospital-Medical Center was designated as the Regional Perinatal Intensive Care Center for North Central Region with Dr. Tim Miller serving as director.
1976: A CT head scanner was added to the hospital’s services.
1976: St. Francis Hospital-Medical Center was designated a Resource Hospital for the Illinois Department of Transportation helicopter, housed at the Peoria Journal Star and dispatched by St. Francis Hospital-Medical Center, serving 28 regional hospitals.
1980s
1980: A children’s heart surgery program is launched and led by Dr. Dale Geiss.
1980: The new $4,500,00 Medi-Park II parking deck officially opened.
1982: The word “hospital” was dropped, and the institution’s official name became Saint Francis Medical Center.
1982: A full body CT scanner was acquired.
1982: Saint Francis Medical Center made national news for using a hemodialysis treatment on a premature baby weighing 1-pound, 12 ounces.
1983: Ground was broken on a $33 million, six-story addition to the medical center.
1983: Saint Francis Medical Center established a home health care program.
1983: Saint Francis Medical Center invested $1.8 million in a Nuclear Magnetic Resonance unit, only the third hospital in Illinois to be approved to use the technology.
1984: A 22-bed Cancer Care Unit was established in the Forest Park building.
1984: Peoria’s first MRI machine became operational at Saint Francis Medical Center, running at maximum capacity of 150 patients per month.
1985: Saint Francis Medical Center offered a non-surgical kidney stone procedure using a lithotripter; the first of its kind in Illinois.
1985: Dr. Beverley Ketel performed a kidney transplant surgery at Saint Francis Medical Center, the first such surgery completed in downstate Illinois.
1986: During the blessing and dedication ceremonies for the 235,000-square-foot E Building addition, Mother Mary John Harvey, O.S.F., announced the facility would be named the Gerlach Building in honor of Sister M. Canisia Gerlach, O.S.F., administrator since 1960.
1987: The areas first heart transplant was performed at Saint Francis Medical Center.
1987: The Helms quintuplets were born at Saint Francis Medical Center.
1987: Bishop O’Rourke dedicated and blessed the new helicopter hangar located near the emergency department.
1989: Saint Francis Medical Center became the first health institution in Illinois to mobilize a cardiac catheterization laboratory. Saint Francis also formed the Central Illinois Cardiac Emergency Network involving 12 hospitals.
1989: The Radiation Oncology Service was established to provide a comprehensive treatment program combining the radiation, medical and surgical oncology departments. The director of the new center was Dr. James L. McGee.
1990s
1990: A news conference was held to announce the formation of Children’s Hospital of Illinois at Saint Francis Medical Center; to bring together all services and programs designed specifically for children.
1990: The NICU opened after a $3.1 million renovation project.
1991: Peoria’s first Directional Coronary Atherectomy (DCA) was performed at Saint Francis Medical Center.
1993: The laboratory became the first in the nation to install a closed-tube, walk-away environment for blood analysis and slide preparation, to protect lab workers from accidental exposures.
1994: PromptCare opened in the Glen Avenue Outpatient Center.
1995: The letters “OSF” were added to create system identity.
1995: Mother Teresa visited OSF Saint Francis Medical Center to express her thanks for the medical attention given to one of her Sisters.
1998: The Mother M. Frances Krasse Family Health Center, a $2 million facility on Peoria’s southside, was blessed.
1998: The new 38,900-square-foot system lab was blessed.
2000s
2000: The Midwest affiliate of St. Jude Hospital was relocated to Children’s Hospital in November.
2001: A new Gamma Knife Center opened, the first in downstate Illinois.
2001: The OSF Saint Francis Center for Health on Route 91 in Peoria opens.
2002: A daVinci Surgical System, used for minimally invasive robotic surgeries, was added.
2002: The area’s first pancreas transplant was performed by Dr. Beverley Ketel at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center on September 6 and two days later she performed the first kidney-pancreas transplant.
2002: The Children’s Hospital of Illinois was the first Illinois hospital to be designated as a Pediatric Critical Care Center.
2005: A Trilogy System, the first in Illinois, was added to the radiation oncology department. The system was the most advanced cancer treatment available at the time.
2007: A new elevated 9,000-square-foot helipad featuring a heated surface and space for two helicopters was completed.
2010s
2010: The new Milestone Building, a $280 million, 440,000-square-foot modernization and expansion of the medical center and Children’s Hospital of Illinois, was blessed and dedicated.
2013: Peoria Bishop Jenky blessed and dedicated the new $51 million Jump Trading Simulation & Education Center.
2014: Illinois’ first hybrid operating suite was established, one of only five in the U.S. using the GE Discovery IGS 730, a minimally invasive system to correct heart and vascular problems.
2015: Dr. Priti Patel implanted a “melody valve” during an outpatient procedure at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center; only 90 hospitals in the world to offer the innovative procedure.
2017: “HealthCare” was added to facility names to further establish system connection across the OSF HealthCare Ministry.
2018: The Almost Home Kids at OSF HealthCare Children’s Hospital of Illinois opened.
2020s
2020: A 24-hour emergency room specially designed for children and families opened.
2020: A new OSF Center for Health located in Midtown Plaza on Knoxville Avenue in Peoria opened.
2021: Groundbreaking is held for OSF HealthCare Cancer Institute on the campus of OSF HealthCare Saint Francis Medical Center.
2021: The Pediatric Ophthalmology Clinic at OSF HealthCare Children’s Hospital of Illinois was blessed. The clinic was the only one of its kind in downstate Illinois.
2022: A 101-ton particle accelerator built in Germany by Varian Medical Systems, was shipped to a port in Maryland and then trucked to Peoria on two tractor trailers; one of them measured 210 feet long or the equivalent of four tractor trailers. This equipment would make possible the proton beam therapy offered at the new OSF HealthCare Cancer Institute under construction.
2024: Peoria Bishop Louis Tylka blessed the new OSF HealthCare Cancer Institute, which began serving patients in February.
2024: A surgical team at OSF HealthCare Children’s Hospital of Illinois performed the first of its kind implant of an extravascular implantable cardio diverter-defibrillator (EV-ICD), in a 2-year-old child.
2024: OSF HealthCare Saint Francis Medical Center was the only hospital in Illinois to offer innovative regenerative medicine.
2025: An OSF Dental Clinic was opened in the Peoria County Health and Human Services building to serve those without health insurance.
2025: Bishop Tylka led a Eucharistic pilgrimage through OSF HealthCare Saint Francis Medical Center and over Peoria in an OSF Life Flight helicopter.