The original hospitality house, River Oaks, was a beautiful Tudor home built in 1928 by Robert Saller and was first known as Riverview Heights. After five different owners, the Robert Mahowald family bought the house in 1956 and lived there until 1970 when it was sold to St. Cloud Hospital.

Between 1970 and 1995 the house was home to the Sisters of the Order of St. Benedict and also used for a time as an office for the St. Cloud Hospital Accounting department. In 1995 the house was dedicated to the hospitality house project. River Oaks Hospitality House opened in October 1996.
River Oaks operated at that location until 2008, when it was razed to make way for the hospital expansion, the largest building project since the Sisters of the Order of St. Benedict embarked on building St. Cloud Hospital in 1928.
Temporary lodging was made available at the white two-story house located just across from the hospital during the construction of the St. Cloud Hospital Gorecki Guest House.
Groundbreaking for the Gorecki Guest House, named after Benedict and Dorothy Gorecki in honor of their generous lead gift, was Sept. 12, 2008.
The Blessing & Dedication of the Guest House took place June 10, 2009.
Gorecki Guest House welcomed its first guests June 15, 2009.

Since first beginning in 1996, St. Cloud Hospital's hospitality house program has served:

• 13,433 guests from:
• all 87 Minnesota counties;
• 47 states and the District of Columbia; and
• 10 foreign countries.

(through June 30, 2012)