Experience Cook County Hospital

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Cook County was incorporated in 1831, two years before Chicago itself. After the cholera epidemics of 1849 and 1854 swept the nation, it was clear the county needed a public hospital. Upon its completion in 1857, Cook County Hospital sat unused for two years as the city had not budgeted for medical equipment. It went through several iterations, including as a training hospital for medical students, and as a military hospital during the Civil War. As a training hospital, it was the site of the first internship in the United States: the interns were unpaid, as were the attending physicians.

Cook County Hospital finally opened as a public hospital on January 1, 1866, and was instrumental in treating victims of the Great Chicago Fire in 1871. It was rebuilt twice, in the 1870s and the 1910s. Eventually, beginning in 2018, the historic Beaux-Arts building underwent a $140 million rehabilitation, and currently operates as a hotel.