This old sanitarium -- note that it wasn't a "hospital" because George Snyder wasn't a doctor -- is also a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark, and a Texas Historical Marker was approved in 1985. The property is also a Glen Rose Landmark, bearing a sign with that notation, featuring the distinctive clock tower from the courthouse on the square. Notable visitors to the Snyder Sanitarium were cattle legend, Charles Goodnight, and controversial Baptist minister, J. Frank Norris. A member of George Snyder's menagerie was an ostrich, Judy, who was either famous or infamous, depending on whom you asked: One visitor thought that Snyder had ruined his eyes, because he was seeing a really big bird! Snyder himself would probably be called a "quack" today, although there are still plenty in 2020 who would love nothing more than to fork over money to someone who claims abilities in in clairvoyance and magnetic healing. There is quite a bit about him in Gene Fowler's "Glen Rose" in Arcadia's
Images of America series, and besides the separation of money from wallets, it sounds like he was regarded as a lovable man of his times by folks who simply didn't know better.
The National Register's Registration Form provides a fairly lengthy description:
The Snyder Sanitarium, constructed in 1919 as a health facility, is a two-story Craftsman style wood frame building with a U-shaped plan. Constructed on a pier-and-beam foundation, the wooden structure was erected by the Williams Lumber Company for local healer George P. Snyder. It was designed to provide thirty-five rooms for patients plus treatment and support areas. Originally a separate building housed a kitchen and dining room. The sanitarium measures 80 feet 5 inches across and each of the two wings are 62 feet 4 inches long. The two-story wood-frame building has beveled wooden siding, much of it remaining from original construction (protected for many years beneath now-removed asbestos siding). On both floors the building has large one-over-one wooden sash windows to facilitate ventilation during the years before air conditioning. The exterior is painted a pale pastel yellow with grey-painted shutters. The hipped roof is covered with grey composition shingles. Four square brick posts support a 29-foot 6-inch-long front porch with a hipped roof. Beneath is a double-door entry with each door having twelve fixed panes of glass. After the Snyder Sanitarium ceased to serve medical needs of health seekers, the structure was converted to become a large bed-and-breakfast business. At that time a new dining room was added to the side of the southwest wing. Also during the 1980s and 1990s, two modern supporting wooden outbuildings were erected on the grounds closer to the Paluxy River to serve hospitality functions. These subsidiary buildings, with no historical connections to the sanitarium, measure 95 feet 7 inches by 27 feet 5 inches and 44 feet 2 inches by 21 feet 2 inches, and are painted, trimmed, and roofed similarly to the historic structure.
George Paul Snyder, Sr., was one of several healers who came to Glen Rose, Texas, during the years around the turn of the twentieth century. Arriving from California in 1915, he quickly gained a following of patients and created his own complex of sanitarium, housing for patients, and even a menagerie of exotic animals to entertain his clients. Patients related that Snyder, who was not a physician, had an uncanny ability to read their minds and thereby diagnose their physical ailments and to help resolve their personal problems. As was common in the early twentieth century, Snyder applied "treatments" that emphasized physical massage and the use of electric devices, and in time he developed a large following. One contemporary quipped that Snyder "made a million dollars off of two-dollar treatments." Although the Snyder Sanitarium itself had only thirty-five rooms to house people overnight, he and his staff could handle upwards of 250 patients in one day. The overflow patients found accommodations in other local hotels, rooming houses, cabins, and riverside camp grounds. Snyder found it profitable to foster an exotic atmosphere at his sanitarium, so he planted banana trees and other tropical plants on its grounds. Although George P. Snyder died in 1942, his widow, family members, and others maintained the Snyder Sanitarium as a medical facility until 1975. By then for a decade it had already been doubling as a commercial residence for elderly people. Efforts to renovate the old sanitarium to become a large bed-and-breakfast establishment began in the 1980s, with the facility opening as the Inn on the River in 1984. It continues to serve that role today, providing public accommodations and hosting corporate retreats.