BOYLE HEIGHTS : Hospital Receives $500,000 Donation
A foundation started almost 100 years ago to help German immigrants receive medical care has donated $500,000 to White Memorial Medical Center to continue treating the mostly Latino immigrant community it now serves.
The money will be used to buy radiation equipment to treat cancer patients, said White Memorial President Bob Carmen.
The Deutscher Hospital Zerein Foundation, which started in 1897, eventually built Lincoln Hospital in 1904 at 453 S. Soto St. It began with a $20,000 donation left by Louise Werner, a German immigrant who wanted a hospital built to serve the needs of newly arrived immigrants.
The foundation sold the hospital in 1980 to a group of doctors with an agreement that its members would receive hospital care there until the end of 1995.
Foundation President Joe Paschen, 55, said the group’s membership has dwindled over the years after an agreement in 1980 to no longer accept new members. The foundation at one point had more than 4,500 members, but now has only 50.
Those members agreed to disband the organization and disburse its assets because it no longer holds fund-raisers or works in the community it was intended to serve, Paschen said. The recent grants are a result of that decision.
Paschen said another grant of $18,000 will be donated to White Memorial this week.
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