The house at 111 West Congress Street is the current home of the American Public University System. However, 63 years ago it was the site of the first Charles Town General Hospital. The Big Yellow House on West Congress Street documents the rich history of one of the most influential buildings in Charles Town.
For supplemental information on The Big Yellow House and the history of Charles Town, see the first link below.
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Mary Ann Hammann, the daughter of Dr. Marshall Glen who is featured in The Big Yellow House on West Congress Street, graciously provided the ePress with additional information on her father. Below you will find her comments:
After an outstanding athletic career at West Virginia University, Elkins native Dr. Marshall Glenn, known better as “Little Sleepy,” returned to Morgantown as both the head football coach (1937-1939) and the head basketball coach (1934-1938). On New Year’s Day in El Paso, Texas, his Mountaineer football team beat heavily favored Texas Tech 7 – 6 in the 1938 Sun Bowl.
Following completion of the two year medical program at West Virginia University, Dr. Glenn enrolled in Rush Medical School at the University of Chicago where he graduated in 1939. He then went to Harper Hospital in Detroit, Michigan for his surgical residency.
In 1942 Dr. Glenn enlisted in the Navy Medical Corps and was commissioned a Lieutenant Junior Grade. He served at Bethesda Naval Hospital, Pensacola Naval Air Station, Iowa Pre-Flight at Iowa City, and the El Centro Marine Base in California. He was assigned to the 1stMarine Division as a flight surgeon and served during the invasion of Peleliu Island. He remained as a Navy Flight Surgeon in the Marines until war’s end.
Dr. Glenn bought Dr. Abner Albin’s medical practice in 1939 and moved his family to Charles Town. The Glenn family lived in the house next to the hospital where Dr. Glenn also had his office. Eventually Dr. Glenn purchased a farm near Charles Town where in 1961 he developed a community golf course.
Over the last 200 years, the country has elected a variety of colorful figures to national office. Drunkards, racists, slave holders, philanderers, war heroes, populists, demagogues, humanitarians, misogynists, embezzlers, patriots, and nepotists, all have walked the halls of the Capitol and the White House. Yet rarely has a man been sent to Washington who could be defined by all of those descriptors at once. Richard Mentor Johnson of Kentucky was one of those men. His heroic, controversial, and eccentric life made him notorious in his day, a tragic hero who walked the stage of American politics for almost half a century. Col. Dick Johnson was the epitome of a frontier Republican from the early part of the 19th century.
Born into a politically active family which had migrated west during the Revolution, his early years were shaped by the Indian warfare that plagued the region. He himself achieved notoriety due to his successes against the great Native leader Tecumseh at the Battle of the Thames, allegedly killing the war-chief himself. Johnson then went on to serve in various positions in the government, at all times being involved in the growth of the nation. His eccentricities as Vice President, when combined with his scandalous relationships with various African American women, resulted in his eventual damnatio memoriae. This biography seeks to fill the gap in the historical record, examining the life and accomplishments of one of America’s more storied Vice Presidents.
David R. Petriello has taught and written on various subjects in American history. His specialties include military history, the impact of disease upon history and society, and 19th political thought. Recent publications by the author include A Military History of New Jersey, Bacteria and Bayonets: The Impact of Disease in American Military History, and an upcoming work on disease and the American presidency.