Many years ago, there was one clinical unit left in the Bulfinch Building and the clinical units had been sequentially named on either side of the Bulfinch Budling as the floors rose from the ground. And so the last clinical unit on the Bulfinch Building was called Bulfinch 7 – it was on the third floor.

One day, there was a medical emergency on the inpatient psychiatry unit – Bulfinch 7 – and so a code was called. And so the medical code team came rushing to the Bulfinch Building, came rushing up the first floor, to the second floor, to the third floor – and they began to look for the fourth floor, sixth floor, they began to look for the seventh floor of this four floor building.

And so there some hapless medical intern had the crash cart – which probably weighed about 100 pounds – on his back, as they were climbing up the stairs looking for the phantom seventh floor. The next day, Bulfinch 7 was renamed Bulfinch 3.

John Herman, MD: The Phantom Seventh Floor