HistoryLink Tours

Virginia Mason Clinic, the fifth hospital on First Hill, opened its doors in 1920 in this Italianate beige brick and terra cotta trimmed building designed by the prominent Seattle firm, Bebb and Gould. It extended from Spring to Seneca Street. The building included a clinic on the ground floor (six doctors’ offices); an 80-bed hospital; and nurses’ quarters upstairs. It looked much like the elegant apartment buildings on the adjoining blocks. Virginia Mason expanded quickly, opening a nursing school in 1922.

Virginia Mason was founded to take the concept of group physician practice a step further: to provide a physician team effort and hospital services for their patients on site. Founders were: Dr. James Tate Mason, a surgeon; Dr. John M. Blackford, an internist; and Dr. Maurice F. Dwyer, a radiologist. The name for the new hospital has its genesis in two young girls. Both Mason and Blackford had daughters named Virginia. Coincidentally, both physicians graduated from the University of Virginia.

This original building has been overshadowed by additions starting with the 1950s-era Buck Pavilion, major hospital additions in the 1970s and later, the Benaroya Research Center, Lindeman Pavilion, and most recently, a new hospital and Emergency wing along Boren Avenue between Seneca and Spring streets.