Old Memories Made New at Good Samaritan Home

No matter where you grew up, chances are that you can remember a place from your youth that doesn’t exist anymore. When the old places are torn down, it seems as if a part of our memories go with them. Now, however, residents of CHHSM member Good Samaritan Home in Evansville, Indiana, are rediscovering memories of the old places through an innovative project that will recreate the streets, architecture and artifacts of the city in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s.

The project to recreate post-war Evansville, announced at the Good Samaritan annual meeting in March, is designed to create familiar surroundings for those suffering from short-term memory loss or disorientation to time and place. Since studies have shown that 80% to 85% of nursing home residents have some form of confusion or dementia, Good Samaritan anticipates that the project will help many of its residents by creating familiar surroundings that can provide comfort, stimulate long-term memory and decrease agitation. “We owe that to people who contributed to this community and made it what it is today,” said Tom Slabaugh, administrator at Good Samaritan.

The construction, estimated to cost $1 million, will transform hallways into five well-traveled streets of Evansville’s past. Murals with a 3-D effect, along with material that looks like brick and stone, will create an urban feel, while floors will give the appearance of grass, cobblestones and pavement and indirect lighting will suggest sky and clouds. The project’s plans also call for functional porches, pillars, columns, street lights, mailboxes and porch lights.

The Good Samaritan Home, which is owned by Lincolnland, Wabash Valley, and Evansville Tri-State Associations of the United Church of Christ, opened its doors in 1962 to provide long-term health care for the elderly. Now Good Samaritan provides a nursing home, residential apartments, an Alzheimer’s community and a new Medicare unit. To learn more about Good Samaritan, visit www.goodsamhome.org; to find more senior living, long term care, or other health and human service ministry affiliated with the United Church of Christ, please visit the Council for Health and Human Service Ministries of the UCC at www.chhsm.org.