Now the academic flagship of Allegheny Health Network, Allegheny General Hospital (AGH) began as a 50-bed infirmary, housed in two adjoining brick rowhomes in what was then Allegheny City, immediately north of Pittsburgh. While Pittsburgh itself had already established several hospitals, including West Penn Hospital, by the 1870s, Allegheny City needed one of its own to accommodate its burgeoning population and to care for the victims of fires, floods and disease outbreaks that often swept over the Ohio River's northern bank. Starting in 1881, the mayor of Allegheny City began meeting with a committee of physicians and prominent residents of Allegheny City, to discuss the construction of, and fund-raising for, a new North Side hospital. Three years later, the committee bought two adjacent properties along Stockton Avenue, near the modern-day Nova Place.