St. Joseph Center Marks 50th Birthday at Benefit

The St. Joseph Medical Center turned 50 gracefully Saturday at a black-tie dinner that raised $250,000 in the Regent Beverly Wilshire’s ballroom.

The Burbank hospital run by the Sisters of Providence honored the companies that helped found and sustain it: Lockheed, MCA/Universal, Disney and Warner Bros. Originally, the corporation CEOs were to accept the Providence Award, but they were all unable to attend.

One guest whose family has had a significant relationship with the medical center since its inception was Roy Disney. He said the hospital was where his children were born, as well as where both his mother, father and his uncle, Walt, died.

“In the ‘40s and ‘50s, it was the only hospital anywhere near the studio,” Disney said. “In the sense that when you get sick there’s a home for you, that’s where you went.”

And though the dinner honored St. Joseph’s corporate sponsors, the underlying stars of the evening were the Roman Catholic nuns who run the hospital. “They serve everyone,” said Cardinal Roger Mahony. “They’ve been very generous to poor people as well as being on the cutting edge of the medical profession.”

The evening began with an invocation by Father James Toal, then emcee Joseph Campanella introduced Louis Nye, who auctioned a 9-week-old Golden Retriever.

There were brief remarks by Assemblyman Pat Nolan (R-Glendale) and Cardinal Mahony, plus performances by comic Steve Kelley and Disney’s Young Symphony Musicians conducted by Henry Mancini. The evening ended with the award presentation by Sister Karin Dufault and St. Joseph CEO Michael Madden.

Among the 400 guests were Sister Georgette Jean, Donna and Victor Kovner, Jack O’Neill, Carol and Carl Samrock, T.J. Baptie, Maria and Javier Uribe, Carol and Tony Grisanti, June and John Broughton, Beatrice and Bill Faeth, Delia and Jack McCormick, Lawrence Miller and dinner chair Deborah Greaney Parker.

The fact that the evening was such a success was as much a tribute to the nuns as to the corporate sponsors. “The sisters were such good administrators right from the very first day,” said Disney. “Those ladies made you feel at home.”