ADDA ELDRIDGE: FOUNDING MOTHER OF ILLINOIS PROFESSIONAL NURSING

The story of Adda Eldredge, Founding Mother of Illinois Professional Nursing does not include battlefields or the hospitals near them, like the stories of Florence Nightingale, Dorothea Dix or Mary Ann Bickerdyke.  Her work to professionalize nursing was in the political arena. Her success is astonishing when one considers for a moment that when she […]

Mother Bickerdyke: A Nurse Among Generals

During the early 1860’s Florence Nightingale was getting the world’s first professional nursing school started in London. In the United States, in 1861, Dorothea Dix was appointed Superintendent of the Union Nurses serving in the Civil War. Ms. Dix set strict standards for her nurses to overcome social stigmas surrounding the presence of women in […]