History
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People
| Rev John M Blackmore |
Rev John Blackmore worked with the Baptist Missionary Society (BMS) in Orissa and was the hospital treasurer for several years in the 1960s. He and his wife were the first couple to be married in the Diptipur church on 19 November 1963.
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Rt Rev Dr C K Das
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Dr Das became Bishop of Sambalpur in 2000 following the death of Rt Rev Tandy. He retires in March 2009. His full name is Rt Rev Dr Christ Kiron Das.
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Rt Rev Dr Samson Das
(1963- )
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Rt Rev Dr Samson Das was born in Puri, Orissa in 1963. He was consecrated as Bishop of Cuttack by the Moderator of the Church of North India at Saint Paul's Cathedral in Kolkata on 9 July 2006. Dr Samson Das wrote his doctoral thesis on early work by the Baptist Misisonary Society in Orissa.
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Rev Lew Davis
(1930- )
Mrs Dorothy Davis
(1930- ) |
Rev Lew and Mrs Dorothy Davis came to India for the United Christian Missionary Society (UCMS) in the mid-1950s. His full name is Lew Arthur Davis and his wife's full maiden name was Dorothy Elsie Armstrong. They worked alongside the hospital in village schools and Bible schools.
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Dr Paul Detweiler
(1926- ) |
Dr Paul Butler Detweiler joined the hospital in 1957 as its first missionary doctor. He was a missionary from the USA with the United Christian Missionary Society (UCMS). He served at the hospital until 1963 when he returned to the USA. His wife was Doris Lee Dani Detweiler.
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Dr Ipsita Dip
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Dr Dip worked in the hospital with Dr Samal from 2006. In October 2008 she became interim acting Director when Dr Samal resigned and moved to Tilda.
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Aileen Hagen
Geoffrey Hagen
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Aileen and Geoffrey Hagen worked in Orissa from 1960 with the Baptist Missionary Society. They worked in Sambalpur, Cuttack and Balangir until they moved to Diptipur in 1965 when Geoffrey took over responsibility for the agricultural project from John Smith. The Hagens left India in 1966. Geoffrey Hagen died in September 2005. The small photo to the left shows them in 1962 with their daughter, Ruth.
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Dr V K Henry
Mrs Nancy Henry
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The Henrys helped re-open the hospital on 21 November 2003. For 30 years before that they were based at the Christian Hospital Bissamcuttack.
Dr Virendra K Henry is a surgeon. Since 2000 he has spent at least several days each month operating at the hospital where he is an honorary Surgeon Consultant. He is married to Mrs Nancy Lott Henry who works with the Church of North India as a teacher of nurses in their eastern region. Nancy Lott came to India in 1959 from the USA as a volunteer from the United Church of Christ. While working in India she met and married Dr Virendra K Henry.
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| Dr Deeptiman James |
Dr James came from studies at Christian Medical College, Vellore (where he had graduated in 2004) to work in the revived hospital from March 2005 until 2006 when he went back to CMC Vellore for further studies in orthopaedics.
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Dr Jacob Koshy
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Dr Jacob Koshy is a consultant surgeon with Second Sight UK. He operated at several Diptipur eye camps in 2008 and 2009.
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| Dr Jayaynand Mallick |
Dr Jayaynand Mallick was Director of the hospital from 2000 until 2002.
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| Miss Marilyn M Mills |
Marilyn Mills worked with the Baptist Missionary Society (BMS) and was assigned to the hospital as Nursing Superintendent in 1968. She served there until 1980.
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Dr Oliver Paul
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Dr Oliver Austin Paul worked at the hospital as an ophthamologist 2007-2008.
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Rev Eric Payne
(1913-2005)
Mrs Betty Payne(1914-1997)
 | Rev Eric Payne and his wife Betty began work in Diptipur in 1953 and helped found the hospital in 1957. Betty held early clinics in Diptipur with Ada White in 1955-56. The Historical Photo Album has a picture of the building in which they used to hold their early clinics.
Eric Payne's full name was Sidney Eric Escourt Payne. He arrived in Bolangir in January 1940 on assignment by the Baptist Missionary Society (BMS). He was joined there by his wife in 1944 after they had married that year in Calcutta. Betty Payne was a trained nurse and her maiden name was Betty Eileen Rose. She had met her husband while he was attending college in Bristol, England where she was working as a nurse. However, for those boys who lived in the Diptipur hostel she was "a doctor, nurse and mother".
From the arrival in India, the Paynes were based together in Bolangir but they moved to Diptipur in 1955 to help establish the new work there. They left India in May 1959 and after a period of furlough in England moved to Trinidad in 1960 retiring from there and going back to England in 1965. They had four children - Elizabeth, Richard, Heather and Andrew. Elizabeth and Heather were born in Orissa, Richard and Andrew were born in England.
Rev Eric Payne was born in Bridgetown, Barbados on 27 Feb 1914 and died in Birmingham, England on 16 July 2005. Mrs Betty Payne was born in Trowbridge, Wiltshire, England on 27 Jan 1915 and died in Birmingham, England on 14 March 1997. They were married in Calcutta, India on 27 March 1944.
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Dr Rajnish Samal
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Dr Samal studied at the Christian Medical College, Vellore where he did post-graduate studies in obstetrics and gynaecology. He then joined the Christian Hospital Diptipur in May 2004 first as its Acting Director and then as its Director. He left in October 2008 moving to work as an obstetrics consultant at the Evangelical Mission Hospital in Tilda, in nearby Chatttisgarh state, west of Orissa.
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| Dr Supriya Sen |
Dr Sen worked with Dr V K Henry for the first few months of reviving the hospital from November 2003.
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Dr Sukant Singh
Dr Shirin Singh
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Dr Sukant Singh came to the hospital as its Medical Superintendent arriving on 26 December 1963 from Ludhiana. A year later his wife, Dr Shirin Singh, came to join him at Diptipur after completing her post-graduate ophthalmic studies. They moved on to Udayagiri in 1968. Dr Sukant Singh was born in Orissa.
The photgraphs show them when they were working at the hospital in the 1960s and in 2007.
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Dr P K Singh
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Dr P K Singh worked at the hospital from 1997 until 2000.
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John Smith
(1929- )
Jean Smith
(1929- )
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John and Jean Smith were Baptist Missionary Society workers who helped establish the agricultural work at Diptipur. They left India in the Autumn of 1964 and since then have lived in Shropshire. Their work has been continued by the West Utkal Agricultural Centre which still has its base in Diptipur. They had three sons (Jonathan, Peter and Paul) all of whom were born in Orissa. Peter and Paul were twins and were born at the hospital in 1960.
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| Mr Snehalal |
Mr Snehalal was a compounder who worked in the early clinic run by Betty Payne and Ada White in 1955-56 before the hospital was built.
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| Dr Sukhnandan |
Dr Sukhnandan was involved with the early 1950s decisions about the choice of site for the hospital in Western Orissa and later on conducted eye camps in Diptipur in 1957.
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Dr Dalaganjan Suna
(1935-2000)
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Dr Suna joined the hospital as its Director in 1968 and served in that role for nearly 30 years until his official retirement in 1996. But after his retirement "there was no one ready to take over. He decided that, if no organisational solution could be found, the least he could do was to go and sit in the hospital and start seeing patients." He continued in this way until he died in a tragic car accident on 21 February 2000 along with Rt Rev Lingaraj Tandy (Bishop of Sambalpur). The memorial stone to him and Rt Rev Tandy in the hospital unveiled by Rt Rev C K Das a year after their death records that Dr Suna was born on 24 April 1935 (see the Historical Photo Album).
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Rt Rev Lingaraj Tandy
(1935-2000) |
Rt Rev Tandy was the Bishop of Sambalpur and a strong supporter of the hospital. He died in 2000 while travelling in a car with Dr Suna. Bishop Tandy died on the spot. Dr Suna died later at the hospital. Rt Rev Tandy was born on 9 September 1935, served as Bishop of Sambalpur from 1976-2000, and died on 21 Feb 2000.
A British visitor to Orissa in 1999 wrote about him as follows: "The Bishop of Sambalpur was a lovely man, and an excellent pastor. Wherever we travelled (and we travelled quite a bit in this Diocese, on some extraordinary roads, to some fairly far-flung places, in some even more extraordinary vehicles!) Bishop Tandy would always greet members of his congregations by name. He seemed to have a relationship with them all, even the smallest children. He even gave one of his own Pectoral Crosses away to one member of our group."
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Dr Tirkey
( -2003) |
The death of Dr Tirkey in February 2003 triggered the closure of the hospital in June that year. It was re-opened in November 2003 by the Henrys.
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Rev L Franklin White
(1913-1976)
Mrs Ada White
(1908- ) | Rev White's full name was Latroy Franklin White and he was born on 13 July 1913. He married Ada Rue Stiles and the couple went to to India in 1940 to work there for the United Christian Missionary Society (UCMS).
Note: They secured their visas for India from the UK Government's India Office in 1940. Ref: File 492/37 Grant of visas for India to Mr and Mrs Latroy Franklin White, U.S. nationals IOR/L/PJ/7/3478 14 Aug - 26 Sep 1940. Documents are held at British Library, Asia, Pacific and Africa Collections; See Online index of visa applications).
Ada White was a nurse like Betty Payne. The two of them held early clinics in Diptipur during 1955-56 which predated the founding of the hospital in 1957. The Historical Photo Album has a picture of the building in which they used to hold their early clinics.
Eric Payne writes about Franklin White: "The first United Christian Missionary Society (UCMS) missionary to be definitely posted to Orissa was Rev Franklin White. It was he who, in 1953/54 began the building of the new centre. He really had to begin at the beginning and even burn the bricks he needed, with the aid of a team of workers, who had to build their own quarters. He used skilled labour, mostly masons from Jagadishpur, (the Mennonite Mission station just over the State border into Madhya Pradesh). His works foreman, William, also came from there. He chose people from outside our area largely because he wished to avoid petty jealousy or rivalry among local people. It also was handy for him to have people who spoke and understood the Hindi language, rather than Oriya, which as yet, Franklin White had not learned. When Franklin went on furlough in the summer of 1954, the Boys' Hostel, with housefather's quarters, three teachers' quarters, the M.E. School, and one bungalow were nearly complete. There was also a well, and an adequate supply of water."
Franklin and Ada White had three children - a daughter, Lucy Anita White, and two sons - Troy and Timmy. Troy was born in 1943 and named after his father (i.e. his full name is Latroy Franklin White). Franklin White retired in 1970 and died in the USA in April 1976.
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Ray Whitfield
Margaret Whitfield |
Ray and Margaret Whitfield were missionaries with the Baptist Missionary Society (BMS) from 1953 until 1966. They were responsible for the Balangir M.E. School where Ray Whitfield was headmaster and also for the Balangir Boys' Hostel. Ray Whitfield wrote: "I remember
Dr Dalaganjan Suna who was a teacher in the Balangir M.E. School whilst I was headmaster, after which he trained as a doctor and did a dedicated and outstanding ministry in the name of Jesus at Diptipur and throughout the whole West Utkal area."
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