Parkview Memorial and the Randallia campus, 1953

Dedicated 8 November 1953 — State Street at Randallia

The hospital the campaign built: The new hospital rose on the city's northeast side, at East State Street and Randallia Drive. Ground was broken on 12 August 1951, and on 8 November 1953 the $3 million Parkview Memorial Hospital was dedicated; the patients moved in from Lewis Street on 21 November 1953. General Electric and the hospital's own employees together contributed $470,000 to the project — a measure of how completely the city's largest manufacturer and the hospital's staff had adopted the campaign. The name itself carries a small open conflict, stated here rather than settled: Parkview's current fact sheets list the institution as "Parkview Memorial Hospital (1953–1955)" and "Parkview Hospital (1955– )," while local accounts remember "Memorial" being dropped from the name only in the 1990s; the campus today is Parkview Hospital Randallia. What is not in dispute is the campus's second career. When the system's flagship moved north in 2012, Randallia did not close — it was kept, reinvested in, and continues as a full community hospital on the 1953 site — its bed count is given as 224 in Parkview's November 2025 leadership profile and 229 in its organizational description; a figure of 204 beds, carried here from a fact sheet that could not be located, is not confirmed by either, the oldest continuously operating hospital campus in the city now that St. Joseph's Broadway building is gone. The nursing school that had begun at Hope Hospital in 1897 moved with the hospital: its building, English Hall, was dedicated at the Randallia campus in the fall of 1953, and the school trained nurses there until its closing in 1991 — the Schools record carries that story in full.

Sources:

1. John R. Riggs, Indiana United Methodist heritage history — the 12 August 1951 groundbreaking, the 8 November 1953 dedication, the 21 November 1953 move, the $3 million cost, and the $470,000 contributed by General Electric and hospital employees.
2. Parkview Health fact sheets (2025–2026) — the name line "Parkview Memorial Hospital (1953–1955), Parkview Hospital (1955– )," carried against the local accounts that date the dropping of "Memorial" to the 1990s; Randallia — bed count unreconciled in Parkview's own materials (224 in the November 2025 leadership profile; 229 in the organizational description).
3. Current section of this history — Parkview Hospital Randallia's continued operation after 2012; its bed count is unreconciled in Parkview's own materials (224, November 2025 leadership profile; 229, organizational description).
4. Schools section of this history — English Hall dedicated at Randallia in the fall of 1953 and the nursing school's 1991 closing.