A step back in time: Renovated home shows what a doctor's office was like in the 1800s

A two-story brick building with forest green shutters sits at 120 W. 3rd St. in Madison, Indiana. The historic property, known as The Dr. W.D. Hutchings' Office & Museum, is about an hour's drive from downtown Louisville and is where a Kentucky native opened his medical practice and built a life for his family in the 1800s.

Dr. William Hutchings would see patients downstairs, while the second floor was an apartment he rented to generate additional income. He and his wife — and their eight children who lived to adulthood — resided in the house next door.

Today, both buildings are owned by the Historic Madison Foundation and are open to the public.

“We’d had the building open as a museum starting in the 1970s,” foundation President and Executive Director John Staicer told The Courier Journal. “But we didn’t have (reference) photos at the time.”

He explained that almost every item on display once belonged to Dr. Hutchings or a member of his family. Dozens of boxes containing everything from books and medical equipment to clothing and children’s toys were donated to the Historic Madison Foundation.

However, images of Dr. Hutchings’ workspace were not discovered until about 10 years ago. Using these pictures, the foundation was able to recreate the exam room and office, crafting a historically accurate idea of what it might have been like to visit the doctor’s office more than a century ago.

Recreating the workspace

When Dr. Hutchings died in 1903, his daughter Lida snapped photos of the space, unknowingly creating the documentation people would use about 110 years later to keep her father’s legacy alive.

“We found the negatives,” Staicier explained. “(Lida) shot the photos the day her dad died, … then we were able to … redecorate and restore the building closer to (its original) look.”

The foundation redesigned the entire first floor, installing historically accurate wallpaper, rearranging furniture, and digging out more artifacts from the archived items to recreate the space as it would have been back then.

Framed copies of Dr. Hutchings’ diplomas and recognitions hang on a wall next to a bookcase full of medical texts and scanned copies of his medical and business records are carefully placed throughout the space to mimic the images from the glass plate negatives.

These records, along with old books and magazines, are arranged in the front room. The back room features a dispensary and a collection of equipment.

“This is where Dr. Hutchings would have prepared concoctions and medications,” Staicer explained. “He did do prescriptions (with) local drug stores, but he also had his own bag of tricks here. (That) was pretty typical of doctors (back then), to have a place where they could sit and mix things.”

The dispensary is on one side of the room, while pieces of medical supplies are spread along the other. These include a microscope and microscope slides, various tools, and electro-therapeutic books and equipment.

“He was very interested in electrical medical treatments,” Staicer said, pointing out the two machines that Dr. Hutchings would use to treat sick people.

Building out living quarters

Though there aren’t any second-floor photos to reference, the apartment has been set up to reflect what the living quarters might have been like back then.

“The upstairs gives a flavor of what it could have looked like if someone was renting the place out,” Staicer said. “We’ve tried to recreate the look of the late 19th/early 20th-century type of model apartment.”

The family’s belongings were used to craft the space and included wash basins, children’s books and toys, an ukulele, and a Knox The Hatter hat box with a handwritten label indicating that the headpiece inside was for the Kentucky Derby.

Staicer added that apartment setups in small towns were rare back then, but that wasn’t the case in Madison.

“There were tons of them here,” he said. “Every building was completely occupied from basement to attic, with people and businesses. It was a very dense urban fabric back then.”

Imagining day-to-day life

The Hutchings family resided next door, but the original structure has been demolished. Another house sits in its place, and inside, the Historic Madison Foundation has placed numerous family artifacts on display.

One area features more of Dr. Hutchings’ medical equipment, complete with descriptions and information about how the items may have been used to give care back then.

A placard next to the childbirth forceps offers guidelines for when they should be used. Next to them, the doctor’s full obstetric tool kit — which he used to deliver 2,000 babies — is laid out.

Another room in the building boasts a rotating display of family artifacts, including photos, books, letters, clothing, and more.

“We have so much, we have to rotate stuff through here,” Staicer said, adding that the medical equipment is always on display, but the exhibit featuring family items changes every two to three years.

“(This property is) one of the great, accurately preserved medical history sites in the country,” he exclaimed. “Every town had doctors, (but) this is one of the few (sites) that survived.”

The Dr. W.D. Hutchings' Office & Museum is open for tours at 11:30 a.m. on Mondays and Fridays through October. It will be closed May 27. Admission is free for Historic Madison Foundation, Inc. members and $10 for non-members. Group tours can be arranged by calling 812-265-2967, or emailing hmi@historicmadisoninc.com. Visit historicmadisoninc.com for more information.

Know a house that would make a great Home of the Week? Email writer Lennie Omalza at aloha@lennieomalza.com or Lifestyle Editor Kathryn Gregory at kgregory@gannett.com.

nuts & bolts

Owner: Historic Madison, Inc.

Home: This is a vernacular Greek revival structure in Madison, Indiana that was an office and apartment building. It was built in 1840. The two buildings on the property cover a total of 2,200 square feet.

Distinctive elements: Hutchings family’s 19th-century medical and family treasures.

Applause! Applause! Donor Elisabeth Zulauf Kelemen; family historian and photographer Lida Hutchings.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Explore the Dr. W.D. Hutchings' Office & Museum in Madison, Indiana