St. Bernard Hospital began more than a century ago as the vision of the Rev. Bernard Murray, the leader of St. Bernard’s Church in Chicago’s Englewood neighborhood. In an effort to bring adequate health care to the community, Murray asked the Kingston, Canada-based Religious Hospitallers of St. Joseph, a community of women religious, for help in founding a local hospital. In 1903, the group sent seven sisters who, along with community residents, raised funds for the hospital’s construction, breaking ground in 1904.