It’s been a while since I’ve read a story headlined “Once Upon a Time,” but there’s a pretty good one about Nicklaus Children’s Health System. “Our story begins on Christmas Eve in 1928 when the manager of the Sheridan Square Theater in Pittsburgh found an abandoned baby girl in his theater,” says the history on nicklauschildrens.org. “A note signed by a Heartbroken Mother pleaded: ‘Please take care of my baby. Her name is Catherine. I can no longer care for her. I have eight others. My husband is out of work. She was born on Thanksgiving Day. I have always heard of the goodness of show business and I pray you will look after my little girl.’”
There were, indeed, some good show business people at the theater that night, a group called Variety Club, Tent No. 1. They agreed to take care of Catherine.
In the 1940s, Miami Tent No. 33 of Variety Club International was founded and decided to support Dr. Arthur Weiland, who organized the purchase of land where Nicklaus Children’s Health System’s main hospital is now in Miami. It took a 20-year effort to pull things together and Variety Children’s Hospital finally opened its doors on March 20, 1950.
In March, the System dedicated a bust of Weiland. His grandson, Arthur Weiland Hutson, told how his grandfather loved golf and admired Jack Nicklaus. “He would have been so pleased and honored that a remarkable golfer whom he admired greatly and his wife—Jack and Barbara Nicklaus—shared in his passion for pediatrics. He would be so proud that the hospital he envisioned so many years ago now bears the Nicklaus name.”
Others continue to help as well. Citadel founder Kenneth Griffin, who has moved his hedge fund from Chicago to Miami, donated a $25 million gift for a five-story, 127,000-square-foot surgical tower.
Nicklaus Children’s Health System is now being led by CEO Matthew Love, who is on the cover of this issue. He told SFBW how he specifically looked to rejoin a children’s hospital organization at this point in his career.
If you think the System is just about Miami-Dade, you would be quite wrong. Nicklaus Children’s Health goes all the way up to Jupiter and all the way over to Naples. It has grown rapidly in its more recent history. It is the only licensed specialty children’s hospital in South Florida and has 850 attending physicians and 500 pediatric subspecialists. It’s an example of how South Florida has grown to provide top-flight health care that saves patients from traveling from out of the region.
With thanks, we can all look back to Variety Club Tent No. 1, Miami Tent No. 33, Dr. Weiland, Kenneth Griffin, and Jack and Barbara Nicklaus for their roles in making this all happen.
