OMCT Farewell Event Update
Event information:
Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2008
1-2 p.m., 3715 Camp Bowie Blvd.
The Haskell Street side of the hospital, by the Jennings Pavilion
OMCT Open date: 1946
OMCT Close date: 2004
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Dr. David Beyer, nephew of Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine cofounder and one fo the first physicians of the OMCT, Dr. D.D. "Danny" Beyer, is on hand as demolition begins. |
A brief OMCT history: Founded in an old mansion on Summit Avenue, the Osteopathic Medical Center of Texas (OMCT) was first called Fisher Hospital, after Dr. Roy Fisher, whose family lived on the second floor. The two-bed hospital soon grew to 12 beds, and it was incorporated as Fort Worth Osteopathic Hospital (FWOH) in 1946 and was staffed by 13 physicians, including Drs. George Luibel, Carl Everett and D.D. “Danny” Beyer. These same three physicians also would begin the Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine (TCOM) in 1966 during off-hours from their professional practices. The hospital moved to the 3600 block of Camp Bowie Boulevard in 1951, then to its current location in 1956. After nearly 50 years of caring for the Fort Worth Community, the OMCT closed its doors for the last time in October 2004.
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Dr. Carl Everett, the last surviving founder of the Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine, is interviewed by a local radio station at the OMCT demolition event. |
TCOM’s professional relationship: Despite the concerns of Dr. Phil Russell, chairman of the FWOH in 1970, about keeping the hospital private, Dr. Everett (pictured at left) convinced Dr. Russell and other leaders of FWOH to allow TCOM to rent the fifth floor, an unused shell, as the first classroom space for the college. Although TCOM held classes in FWOH for only one year, the professional relationship between the hospital and the college continued, as many of TCOM’s students completed rotations, were residents and later went to work there, as they did in hospitals across the state. When the OMCT closed its doors in 2004, it seemed only natural that the land should be used to expand the school which held its first classes inside its walls. In February 2005, the University of North Texas Health Science Center signed an agreement to purchase the 15.5 acres of property formerly belonging to the OMCT.
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Dr. Scott Ransom, UNT Health Science Center President, describes plans for the school's growth as demolition begins on the former OMCT building making room for the expansion of the health science center campus. |
The future of the Health Science Center: A new building erected near the corner of Camp Bowie Boulevard and Montgomery Street, on the site of the former OMCT building, will provide the Health Science Center with large auditorium space, smaller lecture halls, new patient-simulation labs, and a state-of-the-art osteopathic manipulative medicine training facility. The building is planned to be open by August 2009, when a larger class of TCOM students than ever before will begin their training. Other buildings constructed over the next 15 years on the OMCT site, as well as other properties owned by the Health Science Center, will add an additional one million square feet of classroom, lab and office space to the growing school.
Numbers of TCOM students:
First class of TCOM students: 20
Class of 2011: 173
Class of 2013: anticipated to be 205