A Bibliography of Lillian Wald - Term Paper Example

 Lillian Wald (1867- 1940): A Biography Introduction Lillian Wald (1867- 1940), was an American nurse, a social worker, a civil activist for the rights of American women and children, and also a well known writer. Her role in bringing about social reforms for the immigrant population in the New York City during the turn of the 20th century, and her ideas in the form of public health programs are considered to be visionary in nature, and have been replicated in many countries across the world. A founder of the American Community Nursing, Wald remained unmarried and devoted her entire life towards serving mankind, and working towards creating a better world. Body Birth and education: Lillian Wald was born in Cincinnati (Ohio), on March 10th 1867, to a middle class German-Jewish family. Her father Max D. Wald was a merchant dealing in optical parts, her mother was Minnie Wald, and Lillian had a reasonably comfortable middle-class upbringing. In 1878 her family relocated to Rochester in New York, and Lillian was sent to Miss Cruttenden's English-French Boarding and Day School for Young Ladies for the completion of her school education. While caring for her sick sister, Lillian developed a strong liking for nursing, which persisted even after she had completed her school studies. After graduation Lillian wanted to join Vassar College, but was denied entry on the grounds that at 16 years of age she was too young for college studies. Finally in 1889, Lillian entered New York Hospital’s School of Nursing, and after her graduation from this college, joined The Women’s Medical College for further advanced courses. Her start of career as a nurse: While doing her post graduate studies in nursing, Wald was asked to work out a suitable plan on home nursing, for the poor immigrant families residing in the Lower East part of New York. Seeing the miserable conditions that existed in this part of the city, Wald decided to work here as a visiting nurse to serve the poor and needy people. for some time Wald worked in the New York Juvenile Asylum, an orphanage, which was in dire straits and in need of great financial help and skilled management. Appalled by these depressing sights Wald decided to enter the field of social work and subsequent reforms. With this objective, she along with her friend Mary Brewster in 1893 decided to take quarters in Jefferson Street, in the lower east part of New York, in order to be near her patients. At this time Wald coined the term ‘public health nurse’ for the workers whose nursing practices were assimilated with the task of improving the conditions of the community, at large. Financial help did not take long to come, as people soon recognised her tireless efforts towards improving the conditions of the poor people, irrespective of their colour, class or creed. Soon her organisation expanded, and she had four nurses working under her, when Wald decided to move her quarters to 265 Henry Street, in 1895, and it was from here that her institution functioned for the next 40 years. This mission soon became a part of the Henry Street Settlement, a non-profit organisation founded by Lillian Wald in 1893, and which worked for the benefit for the society as a whole. Her efforts attracted the attention of many philanthropists, and Jacob Schiff was one such man who donated secretly to Wald, asking her to take special care of the poor Russian Jews. With such support Wald was soon able to explicate and by 1906 had 27 nurses working under her. By this time her efforts were quite well known and more extensive financial support came from people like Elizabeth Milbank Anderson, and by 1913 the number of staff under her supervision had grown to 92. Her works as an author: Lillian Wald was the author of two well known books that described her work in the field of public nursing. The first book was written in 1911 and was known as The House on Henry Street, while the second one was Windows on Henry Street and published in 1934. Both these books are quite popular even to this day, and Lillian Wald is considered to be the founder of the concept of ‘visiting nurses’, in USA. Her role in working for public reforms: Wald’s nurses worked tirelessly, towards dispensing help to everyone, without any distinctions made, based on religion or creed. Her thoughts on sick school children not being able to attend classes made her send some of her nurses to a public school. Soon this idea was taken up by the New York Board of Health, and it led to the creation of the world’s first public nursing system (National Women’s History Museum, Lillian D. Wald). Wald also persuaded the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company to provide benefits for their policy holders in the form of free visits by the public nurses, and seeing the popularity of the scheme other insurance companies soon followed suit. Wald was also the first to come up with the idea of national health insurance plan, and also helped to establish the School of Nursing at the Columbia University. Wald as a social activist: Wald was much disturbed by the treatment meted out to the African Americans during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, and sought for social integration. She founded the organisation National Association for the Advancement of Colored People or NAACP, that worked towards achieving social amalgamation in USA. Wald was also an activist and believed in women’s rights, and organised many marches in support of suffrage in New York, and later established the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom. Wald was also against the joining of World War I by USA, and always advocated for peace and harmony. Wald was not only content with improving the lives of the poor and needy, but went about teaching certain vocational skills to the women of these classes. She taught them to sew, to cook, and also provided them with recreational activities. In the process Wald also got involved in the American labour movement, and in 1903 formed the Women’s Trade Union League to protect the women belonging to the poor working classes. Wald was against any form of child labour, and lobbied for giving education to all children, including those that were mentally handicapped. She also helped President Theodore Roosevelt in forming the Federal Children’s Bureau, for the benefit of all children. Wald received the Lincoln Medallion in honour of being “an outstanding citizen of New York” and in 1922 the New York Times named her as one of the 12 living great women of America. At the age of 73 in 1940 Lillian Wald died owing to cerebral hemorrhage, and with her death came the end of a great legacy that arose from her endless and tireless strivings towards achieving a better and healthier world for everyone, rich or poor; black or white. Conclusion Lillian Wald, a nurse and a social activist, brought about many revolutionary changes in the field of public/ community nursing. She was a visionary whose ideas have been used as bases to form many practices, that have changed the entire concept of nursing as a community work in these modern times. Works Cited National Women’s History Museum. Lillian D. Wald. Web. 1st August 2010. http://www.nwhm.org/education-resources/biography/biographies/lillian-wald/ Read More