Death at the Hospital

Nothing fails like success. Example: The Weekender, a shoestring weekly in Traverse City, Mich., that was mildly successful at reporting offbeat stories and doing a bit of gentle muckraking until last Aug. 11 at 6:30 a.m.

That was the hour when a General Motors tool repairman named Francis Cronk accepted a collect call from the Traverse City state hospital for mental patients. His mentally retarded son, John David Cronk, 26, had died. The hospital autopsy claimed ''acute pulmonary congestion." Dismayed, the Cronks ordered another autopsy by a private pathologist, Dr. Charles E. Black. His report was startling: death had resulted from severe chest and abdominal injuries, including contusions of the lungs, stomach and diaphragm, apparently caused by beatings. Three weeks later, Weekender published its own account of Cronk's death as well as a series of interviews revealing that beatings were not uncommon in Hall Six, a section for violent patients, where John Cronk had been confined.

Blacklist. By no means a madhouse on a haunted hill, the hospital is run conscientiously by Dr. Duane Sommerness, who since becoming medical superintendent of the institution in 1956, has made notable improvements. When he took over, there were seven doctors for 3,000 patients; now the ratio is 30 to 1,688, with 1,070 other employees, a ratio recommended by the American Psychiatric Association. Today, 54% of the patients come of their own accord; 15 years ago, only 10% did so, and the average stay has been reduced from three years to less than twelve months.

In Cronk's case, Sommerness did not deny that beating was a possibility. But he attacked the newspaper instead of the problem. Hospital committees were formed to write letters to the newspaper's advertisers protesting the articles. "I feel so strongly about these articles," wrote Mrs. Wilma Schmidt, director of nursing, "that I would not be able to do business with any company that continues to support this type of sensational journalism. I'm sure many of our employees feel this way." A list of Weekender advertisers was posted on the hospital's bulletin board; people on the list began getting anonymous phone calls ranging from obscene to threatening.

Perverted Power. Boasting an annual budget of $11.5 million, Traverse City Hospital wields considerable influence in the town (pop. 17,700). The manager of the local Sears, Roebuck and Co. store, David C. Zemke, wrote to Sommerness: "We will refrain from further use of this media. Please assure your employees that we value their patronage very highly and are indeed sorry if we offended them." After hospital officials threatened to move the institution's bank accounts, the National Bank and Trust Co. also canceled its advertising. So did Robert Dean, president of Red Mill Lumber Co., pointing out that "a boycott by employees and their friends would have been staggering."

Michigan Attorney General Frank J. Kelley investigated, then wrote a letter to the state's department of mental health. "We make no judgment relating to the hospital's handling of the Cronk matter," wrote the attorney general. He itemized the high-pressure techniques against advertisers, and added: "Hospital officials have, in effect, made the state a party to an attempt to stifle freedom of the press by the use of economic pressures. [The hospital's] power has been perverted. Such action cannot be tolerated."

But the campaign continues. By last week, advertising in Weekender had dropped 40%, from 1,000 square-column inches per issue to only 600. Editor Suzanne Snyder, 26, and Publisher John McCann were forced to raise the price five cents a copy. She and the paper's two staffers cut their salaries from $80 to $27 a week. "When you've been economically squeezed to a point where you don't have enough to eat," she says, "you begin to think enough is enough. But by that time you're ready to plan the next issue."

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