A Check Up with Coronado’s Earliest Doctors by Kimball Worcester
Public and private health stewardship in early Coronado lay in the hands of a small number of doctors and surgeons. Before World War I, the island’s prominent doctors were Raffaele Lorini and Robert Smart. In the era before antibiotics, with few vaccines—smallpox was still of concern—these doctors battled the sources and causes of affliction and death among Coronado’s visitors and residents. As president of the Board of Health for almost three decades, Lorini implored the populace to eliminate standing water against the threat of mosquito-borne disease, to link their properties to the city’s sewage system, to muzzle dogs during rabies outbreaks, to vaccinate against smallpox and diphtheria, and to wear face masks in public during the influenza pandemic of 1918–19. Lorini was also a long-time house physician for the Hotel Del, with a short initial stint from 1892 to 1894
An elegant sketch of a proposed new Coronado Hospital to be built at the corner of Orange and Cabrillo Esplanade (First Street) that was made for Dr. Arthur Wegeforth, with Louis J. Gill architect. Drawing from Coronado Journal 1925
and returning for the years 1904 to
place in the world,” according to
fifth USS Enterprise (a sloop-of-war,
1929. Lorini’s 1929 memoir, published
Lorini.
1874–1909).
in the Journal upon his retirement,
Smart began his practice in
Smart had his share of colorful
is a handy resource for those years at
Coronado in 1912 and worked until
Coronado medical experiences,
the hotel. In “the early years of the
going overseas during World War I
including having to put down his own
century,” he was sought out by guest
in 1917. Before coming to Coronado
“beautiful setter dog” in 1914 due to
Henry James, a noted Italophile, for
Smart had served as a surgeon both
rabies. By September 1918 Lt. Col.
“frequent conversation,” during which
in the army and in the navy, on the
Smart was in command of U.S. Army
James “averred that he could write
school ships USS St. Mary’s and the
Base Hospital, Unit 96, which arrived
better at Coronado than at any other
in France just in time for the Armistice. Coronado Magazine | P107
