In early December 2009, my brother and his family, our nephew Tyler, and I went atop Pinnacle in Plainville, Ct in search of Hospital Rock. I had been doing some research for a story I was writing and while in the history section at the Plainville Library I came across the history of Hospital Rock.
Small Pox killed many colonialists in the mid to late 1700's. It has also been attributed to killing most of the Native Indian population in the northeast.
In 1794 two doctors from Farmington, Dr. Todd and Dr. Whitman, started what we would basically refer to as a vaccination clinic atop Rattlesnake Mountain. Residents from Farmington, which then included Avon, Plainville, New Britain, Southington and a couple of other towns, would go up to the small pox hospital and purposely get infected with the disease to build an immunity to it. Their skin would be cut and thread covered with small pox puss would be dragged through the cut to infect the patient. After a few weeks when the scabs from the small pox dried off, the patients would return back to the community.
(Foundation of the old Nike Base.)
There was an outcropping of rock that was used as a drop off of supplies for the hospital. This mounded type formation was a perfect spot to lay supplies at a safe distance from the hospital. It was on this rock that became known as Hospital Rock.
Carved in this rock are between 66 and 100 names of those who were patients at Hospital Rock. These names are still visible today.
So, this cool and sunny day in November 2009 we started our search, three and a half hours later we came up short of our goal.
All we had to work with is a description from one of the books I read in the library. We tried to follow those vague directions and wandered for 3.5 hours, crossing creeks, wading through marsh, running into hunters, and a couple of Dungeon and Dragon wannabe's.
It was a fun hike, but finding Hospital Rock would have to come another day. The question was, 'when would I be back from Texas' to visit again.
