.jpg)
Wlaf1450By Charlie Hutson and Jim Freeman
LAFOLLETTE, TN (WLAF)- When city leaders started to talk about a city owned hospital, to keep down confusion with the other hospitals, they referred to it as the La Follette Municipal Hospital. Before the hospital opened, they decided to rename the hospital to something more pleasing to the community since it would serve the surrounding communities. The name was changed to La Follette Community Hospital.
In the days of the mid-1950s, La Follette had two hospitals, La Follette Hospital on South Tennessee Ave. That building still stands across from city hall. The other was Doctor’s Hospital at the corner of West Central Ave. and North 11th Street on the property where the former big Riggs Drug Store building is now located. These hospitals were privatively owned by local doctors.
It was 72 years ago back on May 1, 1954, when the ground breaking ceremony took place on the hill where the new hospital would be built. Back then, the new hospital was going to be built in east La Follette, just inside the La Follette city limits.
On that Saturday, a small crowd (pictured above) along with some of La Follette’s local doctors and politicians gathered for the monumental event.
The hospital opened two years later on Sunday, July 15, 1956, and on the following day, Monday morning, July 16, the hospital started admitting patients. Today marks the 70th year of the La Follette Medical Center, originally the LaFollette Community Hospital.
“I remember being told that my Poppy, grandfather, Pryse, my Daddy, John, and Congressman John J. Duncan went to Washington, D.C., to get us a hospital. Poppy said he was going to sit on the steps of the capitol until someone took care of us in La Follette. He wasn’t leaving. His persistence paid off,” said Rissa Pryse. “I was born at the hospital a few months after it opened,” said Pryse.
After a young Dr. E.G. Cline finished his duty in the Army, he had offers in Los Angeles, Houston and La Follette. “As a courtesy to my school mate Dr. Ron Hall, I came to LaFollette not thinking I would stay,” said Cline. The quality of the then La Follette Community Hospital pleasantly surprised Cline, and, in large part, was key in his staying. The nursing staff was also very good, according to Cline.
“I was the emergency room clerk when I first started at the hospital checking in patients and getting insurance information. I was the first person they came in contact with as they entered the hospital,” said Ann Rutherford. Rutherford said she was young and a little scared at times. “You knew everything coming and going in the ER. It was another world, because it was something different every day,” said Rutherford.
Shirley Sweat, 75 years young, is the longest tenured employee at the LaFollette Medical Center. Sweat began her career at the then La Follette Community Hospital July 25, 1967. After almost 60 years at LMC, Sweat’s latest assignment is hospital operator. Sweat’s been sitting on the front porch of the Tennova – La Follette Medical Center for several years, because it’s her voice on your telephone when you call, and it’s her smile you first see when you walk into the lobby.
As a junior at La Follette High School, Shirley Tibbs Sweat (above) was placed at the hospital by her teacher Jim Reynolds through the school’s DO program. “I started with Jo Ann Franklin in the X-ray department. Then Jeannie Branam brought me over to the records office. From there, I went to the main office where I worked with J.B. Wright, the administrator, and his assistant, Elsie Kibler,” said Sweat.
Sweat’s home away from home marks its 70th year today, and she brags about all the good folks she works with and encounters everday.
Tennova La Follette Medical Center has employed thousands of people over its 70 years. Today, there are 425 individuals employed across the off sites and contract employees. (WLAF NEWS PUBLISHED-07/15/2026-6AM-PHOTOS COURTESY OF WLAF’S CHARLIE HUTSON)