Our Catltolic H sritage in Texas
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San Antonio and the growth of the Sisters' activities required additional revenue. The uncertainty of public charity made the Sisters consult their friends. At the suggestion of Dr. C. H. Wilkinson, they submitted bids to the Federal Government for the care and treatment of marine patients and were awarded a contract immediately to care for marine patients at the rate of $1.00 per day, beginning July 1, 1869. The First Hospital bz.surance Plan. The government contract gave the Sisters some definite support, but much more was needed. In order, therefore, to solve the problem a device similar to one much in vogue today was decided upon. Blake's Bulletin published an explanation of the then unique plan in its issue of August 7, 1869. It explained that there were in every city a large class of persons "not paupers, but self-supporting, and in most cases well-to-do" who had no settled home or sympathetic friends to care for them in time of sickness. It included clerks, waiters, boarders, domestic employees, servants, and unattached bachelors. Now the Catholic Church and her benevolent Order of the Sisters of Charity had opened St. Mary's Infirmary precisely to provide the inestimable care needed in time of sickness by just such persons. Any person paying the &mall sum of twenty-five cents a week, the Bulletin continued, "a dollar a month in advance during health, or $13.00 a year" would be entitled under the new plan to a bed for himself when ill, with medical attendance, nursing, food, and all necessities. The small sum did not pay the bills, but this added to other donations and the consideration that many who subscribed to the plan would probably never have occasion to require it, would enable the Sisters to take care of those who needed the benefits of the plan. 16 The plan was not limited to the immediate members of families. It was opened also to household help. The head of a family could subscribe for one or more beds "that they may have good accommodations for a sick servant" or other members of the household. Here we have the first sug- gestion for family and group insurance. Benevolent individuals could take several subscriptions to provide the help and care needed by their friends when the need arose. "It is an insurance against sickness, and will save many an unfortunate from suffering," declared the Bulletin. 11 The plan proved popular and succeeded admirably. Subscribers were numerous, notwithstanding that the Fall of 1869 was one of the healthiest 16 /bia., 28. 17 Blake's Bulletin, August 17, 1869.
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