Published: May 17, 2008 10:26 pm      

Beloved coal doctor ran HMO-style facility in Colver

EBENSBURG — Dr. Alexander Martin was a company doctor in a company town, but he also was somewhat of a visionary.

A native of Canada, he ran the small hospital in the coal-mining village of Colver for 47 years.

He operated the facility as the area’s first HMO-style medical facility, with monthly fees of $2 for the hospital and $1.50 for doctor’s fees and medicine.

Doing everything from delivering a baby to removing an appendix, Martin and his hospital were as much a part of the mining heritage of Colver as the mine itself.

A snapshot of the rest of the building’s history:

n The hospital was built in 1914 by Eastern Coal Co., which founded the village of Colver and built the houses and company store.

n Martin ran it from 1924 until 1974.

n The United Mine Workers union owned the building from 1940 to 1974.

n The facility was converted to a clinic in 1975.

n Dr. Aragam Subbarao, who then lived in Hollidaysburg, bought the hospital in 1986 for $30,000, promising to convert the building into a modern medical center.

By 2000, he was not paying any property taxes and had left town, leaving the hospital in Colver empty and his other phone numbers in Blair County disconnected.

In 2004, with $7,197 owed in back taxes, the building was on the verge of being sold at a county tax sale. At the last minute, a representative of the owner paid a portion of back taxes, but nothing has been remitted since then, county records show.

Later that year, Subbarao turned the building over to Cambria County Redevelopment Authority, which did some initial cleanup but little else.

Today, the county-owned building remains abandoned and vandalized, with no apparent prospects for the future and with fire officials calling it a hazard.