Babies Hospital was founded in 1887 by five women “to provide medical and surgical aid and nursing for sick babies.” It soon became one of the nation’s pre-eminent children’s hospitals. Within twenty years Babies had established an outpatient department, a training school for nurses, and a summer hospital at the New Jersey shore. It became a teaching affiliate of the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1900. L. Emmett Holt, Herbert Wilcox, Sr. and Rustin McIntosh were among the medical directors of the hospital in the 20th century.

After several brief stays at various locations, Babies Hospital settled in two houses on Lexington Avenue at E. 55th Street. In 1902, these buildings were replaced with a modern structure where the Hospital remained until it moved to the Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center at West 168th Street in 1929.

Babies Hospital remained a separate corporation until its complete merger into Presbyterian Hospital on Dec. 31, 1943. The pediatric service at Columbia-Presbyterian retained the Babies Hospital name; it was renamed Babies & Children’s Hospital in 1994 and became the Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital of New York in 2003.