Independence Through Nursing

Bedside patient care class at the Johns Hopkins Hospital School of Nursing, c. 1905 (Chesney Medical Archives)

An era of nursing reform

Nursing was another avenue for women's independence. Many women were inspired by Florence Nightingale, whose ideas transformed modern nursing into a skilled professional field.

Hospitals established training schools to benefit from the unpaid labor of student nurses, but graduates soon organized to assert their professional autonomy. They confronted the budget lines of hospital administrators and the sexism of male physicians to gain better education and more control over their work. Many became vocal about social issues that affected the health of their patients.

Mary Adelaide Nutting, second superintendent of nurses at Johns Hopkins, 1906 (Chesney Medical Archives)

Nursing leaders and organizations

Before the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing opened in 1889, hospital trustee Francis King consulted with Nightingale and closely studied her recommendations. However, much work remained for later nursing reformers. At first, students were sent wherever they were needed and might not get experience in all clinical areas.

In 1893, Hopkins nurse educators Isabel Hampton and Mary Adelaide Nutting helped establish the American Society of Superintendents of Training Schools for Nurses. This group pushed for uniform curricula nationwide to ensure that students received adequate preparation for the job.

They also helped to establish the Nurses' Associated Alumnae of the United States and Canada, an organization representing all graduates of nurse training schools, which became the American Nurses' Association in 1911. Because this group failed to advocate for the needs of its African American members, Black nurses including Martha Minerva Franklin founded the National Association of Colored Graduate Nurses (NACGN) in 1908. The two groups would merge in 1951, as white nurses agreed to work towards desegregation and equity in leadership.

November 1918 issue of the Johns Hopkins Nurses Alumnae Magazine (Chesney Medical Archives)

Mary Eliza Mahoney (Wikimedia Commons)

Training schools produced a strong sense of professional identity. Graduates used alumnae associations to promote licensing laws and public health policies. These activities won them a new level of popular respect; as the practitioners who worked most closely with patients, nurses became advocates for improved quality of care.

Mary Eliza Mahoney became the first African American to secure a professional nursing license in 1879. Though she attended an integrated school, most nurse training, including that at Johns Hopkins, was segregated. Mahoney was a founding member of the Nurses Associated Alumnae of the United States and Canada (NAAUSC). However, disillusioned by the NAAUSC's treatment of its Black members, Mahoney later helped to form the National Association of Colored Graduate Nurses.