more by his community. This is the best insurance of remaining in
good health.

I commend you for your past efforts and encourage you to continue
them, to the end that we in Maryland may reach the highest possible
level of performance in the care and treatment of the mentally ill and
mentally retarded.

ADDRESS, SOUTH BALTIMORE HOSPITAL FUND
BALTIMORE

December 9, 1963

Mr. Gruehn, General Purnell, members of the board of directors
of the South Baltimore General Hospital, gentlemen:

I bring you greetings, and I congratulate you upon being here.
If you will look around you, you will see what I mean. In this room
are the people in the Baltimore area who get things done — the in-
dustrial, business, financial and commercial leadership of this city,
and leaders of public life. You men of decision are known for the
jobs you have done for your companies and organizations, as well as
the assignments you have taken on and successfully carried out in
behalf of the community and its people. Because of your achievements
and your status as leaders, you have been invited here to receive in-
formation about the need for a new South Baltimore General Hos-
pital. It is a pleasure and a duty for me to bring this information to
you, and to bring you up to the minute about this need, so vital to
Baltimore — and of even more vital importance to you business leaders
and to every believer in the free enterprise system.

First, Maryland — and metropolitan Baltimore in particular — must
have hundreds of additional hospital beds to meet the increasing needs
of our growing population. You know this, for you have all heard
of the distressing hospital situation we have, with too many of our
hospitals costly to operate, obsolete and lacking in buildings. Ever
since the Baltimore hospital survey, published in early 1958, all in-
formed citizens have begun to recognize this need and the necessity
to do something to meet it. But, again and again, in striving for more
beds, we have seen the emphasis placed upon hospitals to the city's
north and its west. The 60-year-old South Baltimore General Hospital,
called upon to serve an ever burgeoning industrial complex — to serve,

356