By VOTP News STL Staff
September 20, 2026
ST. LOUIS — Long before equal access became the language of modern health care, Homer G. Phillips Hospital gave Black doctors and nurses a place to train, practice and serve at the highest level.
The hospital opened in 1937 in The Ville, replacing an inadequate segregated facility that could not meet the needs of St. Louis’ growing Black population. It became a major public hospital and a training ground for medical professionals who were routinely excluded from white controlled hospitals and schools.
According to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, more than half of the Black graduates of U.S. medical schools were accepted into training at Homer G. Phillips Hospital by 1939. The hospital offered instruction across numerous specialties and, by 1961, had produced more Black doctors and nurses than any institution in the world.
The impact reached far beyond one building. Its physicians and nurses carried their expertise into hospitals, universities and communities across the country, while the institution proved that Black medical excellence was never the problem. Access was.
Homer G. Phillips Hospital closed in 1979, but its legacy remains part of St. Louis and American history. It stands as a reminder of what Black communities built when discrimination tried to lock the door.
Sources: Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture and Nine PBS.
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