Morristown Medical Center broke ground this week on a two-story, 72-room expansion to its Gagnon Cardiovascular Institute.
Hospital President Trish O’Keefe wielded the same silver shovel that broke ground at 100 Madison Ave. in 1949, when the hospital was relocated from Morris Street.
That 201-bed project cost $2.57 million, in the same year when Joe DiMaggio became baseball’s first $100,000 player.
Today, Morristown Medical Center has 724 licensed beds; in 2015, it agreed to pay Morristown more than $25 million in taxes for the next decade,
(More perspective: In 1949, the average U.S. worker earned $2,844, the average new house cost $7,450, a gallon of gas was 17 cents, and 70 cents was the minimum hourly wage, according to the Washington Times.)
