MultiCare Tacoma General Hospital
hospital in Washington, United States

MultiCare Health System's Tacoma General Hospital is the largest hospital in Tacoma, Washington. It is a level II trauma center with 437 beds and the second-largest obstetrical care center in the state of Washington. Tacoma General began serving patients in 1882. The hospital is owned and operated by MultiCare Health System, a Tacoma-based not-for-profit integrated health organization.
History
Tacoma General's beginnings trace back to the earliest days of the city of Tacoma. Founded in 1882, seven years before Washington achieved statehood, the Fannie C. Paddock Memorial Hospital opened its doors in a former dance hall at 2511 North Starr Street in what is now Old Town Tacoma. Frances (Fannie) Chester Fanning Paddock was the wife of John A Paddock, who was the first Episcopal bishop of Washington Territory. As Fannie Paddock prepared to move West to join her husband, she asked him what was the greatest need in Tacoma. He responded that they needed a hospital. She began raising money by asking her friends to support this cause and had collected $500 before she started her journey to Tacoma.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “MultiCare Tacoma General Hospital” is hospital in Washington, United States. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through MultiCare, Tacoma and General, not as a finished interpretation.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 3, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6934525. Authority coordinates are 47.259, -122.453. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1882.
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This entry incorporates text from “MultiCare Tacoma General Hospital” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.