Piedmont Tuberculosis Sanatorium

M-43

Piedmont Sanatorium opened in April 1918 as the first public residential facility in Virginia for African American patients with tuberculosis. More than 12,000 patients from across the state were treated here over the next five decades. The sanatorium offered residents an open-air treatment emphasizing rest, a healthy diet, and limited activities, including occupational therapy. Piedmont’s nurse-training program, a two-year course that provided Virginia’s only advanced training for African American women in tuberculosis care, graduated at least 350 nurses from 1920 to 1960. In 1967, the facility became Piedmont State Hospital, and tuberculosis care was gradually phased out.

Department of Historic Resources, 2022

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References/Bibliographic Citation:

Richmond Times Dispatch, 25 March 1915, 2 May 1918, 21 Dec. 1919, 7 Jan. 1967. Norfolk Journal and Guide, 3 Feb. 1917. Richmond Planet, 15 Nov. 1924, 14 Dec. 1929. Monthly Health Bulletin, Virginia Department of Health (Nov. 1918, Nov. 1938). J.J. France, “A Post-Graduate Course in Tuberculosis at the Piedmont Sanatorium, Burkeville, Va.,” Journal of the National Medical Association, vol. 12, no. 2 (April 1920): 16-21. H.G. Carter, “Tuberculosis Work Among Negroes,” Southern Workman (April 1920): 175-179. Annual Report of the State Board of Health and the State Health Commissioner (1919, 1920). Annual Report, Virginia State Department of Health (1950). “History of Piedmont Geriatric Hospital,” typescript. E. Thomas Ewing, Kiana Wilkerson, and Katherine Randall, “Piedmont Tuberculosis Sanatorium,” Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society News (July/August 2021). https://sites.google.com/vt.edu/catawba-piedmont/tbhistory?authuser=0