My mother-in-law Mary told the story like this.

In 1919, Jim and Anna (Monahan) Corrigan lived with his mom, Mary Walker Corrigan, above his medical office in a double house on West Broad Street, Hazleton, Pennsylvania.  Anna went into labor on June 25, and that night Jim, a general practitioner specializing in obstetrics, delivered his own first born child.

While Mary tended to his wife, Jim cradled his infant daughter and headed to the only phone in the house, down in his office. After placing a few calls to announce his Mary Margaret’s arrival the euphoric father returned to Anna and Mary.

“Jim, where’s the baby?” asked his mother.

He turned on his heel, ran down the stairs and scooped Mary’s swaddled little body off the desk where he had absentmindedly set her while talking with his brothers.

Later James A Corrigan, MD recorded this delivery, as he  did every delivery, in a pocket-sized notebook, and checked off the entry when he officially recorded Mary’s birth with Pennsylvania Vital Statistics, Form No. 11.

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These records were identified by Mary Corrigan Delehanty as belonging to her father, James Aloysius Corrigan, MD.