Alma record. (Alma, Mich.) 1878-1928, 1895-10-11
GRADUATING ADDRESS
Alma Training School of Nurses.
By ELMoRE ). PErrYJonN.

BIZ ELMORE ). PETTYJOHN.
a few words at to the beginning and
| history OF our special work
Ia l79S Dr.. Valentine Seaman gave
the first systematic course OF instruction
To the nurses Of New York hospital.
Thirty years later Elizabeth Fry gave
instruction 10 the nurses Of Guys Hos
pital, London. In 1863 Theodore
Fliedner, whose interest had for
somtime been excited 10y the sick poor,
came To the conclusion that hospitals
could best be served 10y an organized
booy of women specially devoted 20 the
work-and he accordingly established
/ the first deacoue5s house and hospital
AT kaiserworth, "a little town ON the
Rhine. a few miles below Dusseldorf.
The de cOuesses devoted themselves 10
the care OF the poor, the sick and the
young. They were dressed in a plain
uniform and their engagement was not
1nal. They could leave their work and
return 10 ordinary life if they chose.
was established AT Berlin and another
Al GOtteugen
The training school Of St Thomas
Hospital, London, founded in 1850 by
Miss Nightingale on fund of $3.50, coo,
which had been subscribed as direct
| gift to her by the people in grateful
recognition IF her Invaluable services
in the Crjmea, and which she had
modestly declined to accept, has served
as model for other similar schools and
as a competent authority says, has set
/ III motion a system of caring for the
| sick which has brought light and com
fort into more dark places than perhaps
any other movement of this century. "
1t was at this IN ghtingale Home, as
it has been lovingly christened, that
d.. w. Gill Wylie. who volunteered to
go at his own expense in behalf of the
state Charities Aid Association of
New York, y TO examine the methods
of nursing in the great capitals of
Europe, found what he was seeking.
His report of that school and the work
its pupils do in London was made the
basis on which the Bellevue Hospital
Training School of Nurses was
founded in 1873. Since then other
schools have been established in New
York, Philadelphia, Boston and all
other large cities of our country. Ia
Chicago, the Illinois Training School
for Nurses was founded about fifteen
years ago. Recently it has received "A
legacy from The John Crerar estate of |
$50 600, which constitutes special |
fund, the income 10 be devoted to the |
maintenance Of the John CreTar nurses |
who will be sent TO families of limited |
means unable TO pay the regular fee of
trained nurses.
over 80 have been established in |
hospitals aud sanitariums throughout |
the land, from which about 5000 nurses |
have been graduated and which now |
have over $500 students The first at
tempt to supply nurses TO the poor was
in Liverpool in 1859, where a beginning
was made with single nurse, she
being sent to work in small district
This experiment, proved so success
full, such good results being obtained,
not only in allevating suffering but in
the moral good effected, that its pro-
moter, Mr. w. Rathbone, NJ. p, was
encouraged to extend the work and
within four years the whole of Liver
pool was divided into eighteen districts,
each supplied with trained nurse.
This success gave an impulse to the
work all over the country and monthly
district nursing was started in many
towns, and the system is now spreading
rapidly over every part of Great Britain
and Ireland.
In this country the first society to
employ the services of hospital trained
nurse for the care Of the sick poor i'm
their homes was the "Woman's Branch
of the New York City Mission and
Tract Society" in the year 1877. In
Boston and Philadelphia similar work
was begun in 1856, and the Visiting
Nurse's Association of Chicago was
in 1889. Other cities are
taking up the same kind of work, while
the Methodist Episcopal church, with
its interchangeable zeal, has placed a {
deaconess home in almost every large ;
city of the Union, where medical and {
training are furnished free I
There is one in Detroit, and one dedi. {
Gated in Grand Rapids last fall {
Hampton, Virginia, includes instruc- I
ton in this kind of nursing in its train. I
ing school for colored nurses Trained !
nurses we're first introduced into a a
county poor house in Rensselaer, Co $
\ Y, of which Troy is the county seat. a
II is believed that at no distant day d
his good example will be universally -
for tho human haort 10 o,rox., a.,