At their statewide meeting, the Baptist General Convention in Oklahoma announced a planning committee, led by Gov. Robert S. Kerr, for a new hospital in Oklahoma City. Dr. T.B. Lackey, executive secretary-treasurer, soon took up the charge and championed the dream of a new hospital.

The Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma, formed in 1906, was dedicated to providing health care as a way to serve the physical and spiritual needs of the state. Hospitals were needed in many Oklahoma communities at the beginning of the 20th century to provide important medical services, and creating them fulfilled one of the BGC’s key missions of caring for others.

The BGC established several rural hospitals in the early 1900s, but it wasn’t until 1946 that a planning committee was created to explore building a Baptist hospital in Oklahoma City. Among those appointed were Gov. Robert S. Kerr; Dr. Andrew Potter, executive secretary-treasurer of the BGC; R.C. Howard Sr., BGC president; Willis R. Howard; and U.S. District Judge W.R. Wallace.

Although the committee was committed to its task, when R.C. Howard Sr. and Andrew Potter died shortly after the committee was formed, reorganization took some time. In 1951, Dr. T.B. Lackey was elected as the new executive secretary-treasurer and reignited the hospital planning effort. “We believe that medical science and the spiritual emphasis can work together in maximum treatment of body, soul and mind,” he said. Dr. Herschel Hobbs, the influential pastor of the First Baptist Church of Oklahoma City, chaired the new committee.

In 1953, BGC officials chose a Texas fund-raising firm to develop a strategy for raising $2.5 million. Lt. Gen. Raymond S. McLain was selected as chairman. When McLain died, however, concerns arose that the hospital would remain but a dream.

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