August 19, 2022
Fifty-two years ago, in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Celia, First United Methodist Church of Aransas Pass, Texas, became the temporary hospital for its battered community.
Pneumonia and other serious illnesses got treated there. Surgeries were performed. Ambulances came and went.
And while historical accounts vary, either 85 or 86 babies — including three sets of twins — were born in Sunday school rooms converted to delivery rooms, all within wailing distance of the sanctuary.
Angelina “Angel” Childs’ mother gave birth to her in one of those rooms.
“She named me ‘Angel,’ being the fact that I was born here,” Childs said in an interview at the church.
On Aug. 14, First United Methodist Church of Aransas Pass held a reunion service and luncheon, commemorating the four-month stretch when the church filled in as the community hospital.
Attendees included Childs, two fellow Hurricane Celia “babies” born at the church and others who shared stories and lessons from a hard but inspiring time.
“You did what you had to do. It was an emergency,” said Ernestine “Ernie” Brown, 80, who shifted from her regular hospital nursing job to care for patients at First United Methodist of Aransas Pass.
Billie Robinson got laughs from the reunion service crowd, describing her experience at the church on Nov. 7, 1970.
“I had my little one here — well, she wasn’t so little. Ten pounds and 8 ounces,” said Robinson, 79.
Jeannie Zirkel came to the reunion, having lost her husband, the Rev. Milford “Zeke” Zirkel, earlier this summer. He was the pastor when the church served as a hospital.
“I don’t ever remember Zeke coming back and saying, ‘Oh, somebody doesn’t want to do this,’” she said. “Everybody was willing to help, and everybody was willing to give up a little bit of their space, a little bit of their time, in order to help the community.”
Hurricane Celia has faded in national memory, but when it hit Corpus Christi and nearby coastal towns like Aransas Pass on Aug. 3, 1970, it was a category 4 storm, with 140 mph winds. Fifteen people died in Texas, and thousands of homes, businesses and commercial fishing boats were destroyed or badly damaged.
Both hospitals serving Aransas Pass were out of commission. But First United Methodist Church fared better.
The steeple came loose and blew up into the air, coming down spire first to puncture the roof like a dart. That was the worst of it, and patchable.
Zeke Zirkel agreed to a request by Dr. William Tinnerman, the local public health officer, that the church become a temporary hospital. Conditions in Aransas Pass were desperate, requiring the National Guard and Red Cross.
“No power, no water, no telephone for three weeks,” said Red Barker, 98, a longtime church member.
Dewey Holden, also 98 and Barker’s friend since seventh grade, as well as a church trustee in 1970, recalled, “They hooked up a humongous generator to the church.”
The fellowship hall became a communications center and hospital administration area, with ham radio operators handling dispatch. The church’s education wing was turned into an 18-bed ward. The nursery room — with its large observation window — took on extra cribs for newborns.
Patients’ meals were cooked in the church kitchen, and a storage room became a darkroom for developing X-rays.
The church hospital took in its first registered patient — a man with a heart condition — just three days after the hurricane, the Corpus Christi Caller-Times reported. But the church already was the scene of a frantic effort to prevent tetanus and typhoid.
A nurse recruited Carl Rohlfs, then the 19-year-old youth director at First United Methodist Church of Aransas Pass, to give injections.
The first baby born at the church arrived on Aug. 8, 1970. More births quickly followed.
The church’s Sunday school classes met in the sanctuary, to make room for medical care. Worship services continued, but not without distractions, including meal preparation for the patients.
“We could smell that good food cooking,” Holden said. “I think everybody got a little anxious, a little hungry, before the sermon was over.”
The church’s Sunday school classes met in the sanctuary, to make room for medical care. Worship services continued, but not without distractions, including meal preparation for the patients.
“We could smell that good food cooking,” Holden said. “I think everybody got a little anxious, a little hungry, before the sermon was over.”
