Many firsts occurred at the hospital first use of penicillin for tubercular patients, first air transportation of Naval patients across the United States with final destination in Norco, first uses of polio vaccine outside of Pittsburgh, first hand-held X-ray machines, as well as advances in prosthetic devices and occupational therapy. At the hospital's peak (1945) over 5000 patients were being treated. The facility was quickly altered and expanded to include isolation wards (the hospital was the designated national tubercular and malaria treatment center for the United States Navy as well as the Naval Pacific Coast Polio facility), a 200,000 sq ft (19,000 m2) ward addition (which was christened by Eleanor Roosevelt), a marvelous chapel, complete theater, gymnasium (where wheelchair basketball was born on the wheels of "The Rolling Devils"), a nurses quarters, corpsman quarters, etc. The first patients arrived from the Pearl Harbor attack and were housed and treated in the luxurious rooms of the former resort. In September–October 1941, the United States Navy purchased the resort, and on December 8, 1941, the day after Pearl Harbor, the resort was commissioned the United States Naval Hospital in Corona (the hospital was actually in the town of Norco, but the post office was Corona-based, hence the name). During this era, Jeanette MacDonald, Joan Crawford, Basil Rathbone, Stan Laurel and other stars regularly visited the Norconian, as did sports stars Lou Nova (boxer), Helen Wills (tennis), local star Jess Hill (USC coach and star, New York Yankees) and the 'ol Pitt football team of 1935. The same year MGM tossed their own party at the Norconian, and in 1940 Fox studios followed suit. In 1938, Walt Disney Studios, to celebrate the success of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, threw a party that has become the stuff of legend. The fabulous Norconian sputtered along with some tremendous landmark occasions. In 1935 the resort suddenly reopened, likely due to a cash infusion from Rex Clark's former wife's trust fund. Norco was in the midst of a seven-year drought, and the agricultural success of the 1920s was all but a memory. Rex Clark, on a personal front, was divorced from Grace Scripps and struggling financially. Unfortunately, the Great Depression quickly killed the Norconian's amazing success, and by 1933 the resort was closed. Boggs (who piloted the first "blind" landing made entirely using radio signals in 1931) crashed and was killed while making a routine approach to this airfield. Tragically, in 1933, famed aviator Marshall S. Will Rogers, who also shot several films in the vicinity, regularly utilized the Norconian air field. Norma Shearer shot two films at the resort and could be seen riding the trails on horseback on many occasions. Several films were shot at the Norconian, and it was not unusual to see Buster Keaton or Babe Ruth on the golf course (in 1938, actress Lona Andre set a new record for speed in women's golf, shooting 156 holes in 11 hours and 56 minutes). The resort was initially a great success, with film and sports stars of the day as regular visitors. In less than three years, Clark's engineer, "Captain" Cuthbert Gulley (Ap– 1961) (so named for his service in World War I) laid out streets and installed pumps and reservoirs and on May 13, 1923, "Norco" held its grand opening. The land was a failed agricultural community known as "Orchard Heights", but Clark renamed this hilly area "Norco", based on its position North of Corona. In 1920, after years of land speculation in the San Diego/Julian area of California, Rex Brainerd Clark (May, 1876 – Aug 31, 1955), through his North Corona Land Company, purchased 15 square miles (39 km2) of land just north of Corona. Originally called the "Lake Norconian Club", it opened on Februin this rural community, whose main businesses were poultry, rabbits, and agriculture. The Norconian Resort Supreme is a former hotel/resort in Norco, California, built in the 1920s, largely intact after over 70 years as a naval base and prison. Please do not visit without express permission from the land owner.
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