Percy Jones Army Hospital

The Hart-Dole-Inouye Federal Center, formerly the Battle Creek Federal Center, is a complex of federal buildings located in Battle Creek, Michigan.

The facility has a colorful history intertwined with notable Americans. The property successively served as a sanitarium, military hospital, and offices.

In 1866 the Seventh Day Adventists established the Western Health Reform Institute on eight acres of land, the former residence of Benjamin Graves, a judge of the Michigan Superior Court. H. S. Lay, the first physician in charge, and James and Ellen White, early founders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, were instrumental in founding this health institution. The goals of the institution were to teach the Adventists' version of holistic medicine, which stressed the importance of temperance and preventative medicine, taking in visitors and advocating the use of Graham bread and counseling eight hours of sleep at night. From this farmhouse the institution struggled to live up to its name but there were ideas and propositions for a building that would lead to a worldwide reputation.

In 1876, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg, medical director, renamed the property and expanded the facility to include a hospital, central building, and other cottages. Much of the original sanitarium burned down in 1902. A large building by architect Frank Mills Andrews opened in 1903 at a cost of $1 million and was considered a marvel of modern planning and medical technology. Under Kellogg's auspices, the sanitarium expanded, and a tower addition was completed in 1928.

In 1942, the United States Army bought the buildings and converted them into the Percy Jones Army Hospital, a 1,500-bed military hospital for treating soldiers wounded in World War II. It was named the Percy Jones Army Hospital after Percy L. Jones, the renowned colonel who pioneered modern battlefield ambulance evacuation and was instrumental in creating the U.S. Army Ambulance Corps. The Army continued to operate the hospital through the Korean War. After treating nearly 95,000 patients, the hospital closed in 1953.

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