The New Patriotism Is Peace Women's International League for Peace and Freedom Flier, date unknown

Reader alert:  acute blogorrhea ahead.

Captain Dana of the Carnival of the Elitist Bastards (Eggheads Unite!) asked me to nominate nurses for EB badges of honor.  My nominations after much rumination are Patricia Moccia, who walked the plank of the USS Nursing after the National League for Nursing for which she ably captained through incredibly rough seas mutinied and is now an editorial chief for UNICEF (nursing’s profound loss and children round the world’s gain), and Lillian Wald, who I betcha don’t know.

Young: Lillian Wald in nurse uniform

Far too many in the US still carry this mental image as their modern day notion of American nurses. But in so many ways, this is wrong and harmful to the public interest. I’d much rather people carry this picture of the woman who may arguably be called, America’s nurse:

Lillian Wald visiting tenement patients in their homes - NY City

If I have a hero, it’s Wald.

While she is credited with establishing the field of social work, she actually established the field of public health nursing, public health as a governmental function, and in her spare time, she established the first university graduate studies in nursing.

The Settlement house movement proved to be the most influential and far-reaching of urban reforms. Settlement house workers aimed to understand the challenges facing newly-arrived immigrants and help them adjust to life in crowded American cities. Armed with first-hand knowledge about terrible housing, exploitation in the workplace, lack of occupational safety, inadequate education opportunities and woeful health care, female reformers launched campaigns to address these urban problems.

One such leader in the Settlement house movement was Lillian Wald , whose Henry Street Settlement and Visiting Nurse Association provided residents of New York City’s Lower East Side with indispensable community programs. A champion of Human Rights, Wald’s dedication won the hearts and respect of the immigrant community and the wrath of city officials. Wald viewed herself an agent of the poor, spending time in their homes and then speaking out against malnutrition and poor living conditions. She understood the sweeping reforms that were necessary to rectify these problems and tried to persuade local government officials that alleviating poverty was ultimately their responsibility.

I am a beneficiary of Wald’s commitment to advanced nursing education.  We are both associated with Teachers College, Columbia University, where many of the nation’s nursing pioneers developed nursing theory, nursing research agendas, patient advocacy, and nursing education curricula.  Nursing leaders and TC go hand in hand.  It’s difficult to find a nursing leader who doesn’t have a connection to this school.

Wald convinced a philanthropist to endow a Department of Nursing Education there, and then she lectured on the faculty. To get a feel for how far-reaching Wald’s legacy is, note the disparate and world-renowned libraries that archive her letters and papers.

She developed public health nursing as we still know it.  She established school health nursing.  She established free lunch programs.  She established settlement houses and community organizing. She established special education for children with physical and developmental disabilities.  She initiated immigrants rights and reform. She was a peace activist.  She was a women’s suffrage activist.  She was a factory worker safety and rights activist.

What didn’t she do? Sit on her heels.

Wald coined the term “public health nurse” in 1893 for nurses who worked outside hospitals in poor and middle-class communities. Wald helped to initiate a series of lectures to educate prospective nurses at Columbia University’s Teachers College in 1899. Students attended classes at Columbia and received their field training at Henry Street. This series led to the formation of the University’s Department of Nursing and Health in 1910. Wald and her colleagues in the public health movement recognized the need for the establishment of professional standards for public health nurses. Like other professional organizations, the National Organization of Public Health Nurses (NOPHN) was designed to set professional standards, share techniques and protect the reputations of its members. Wald was elected as the organization’s first president.

The most interesting web based narrative of Wald’s accomplishments is from the Jewish Women’s Archive. Every page is overflowing with significant contributions to the public’s health at all levels, to the fields of social work and nursing, to immigration reform, to worker safety, to women’s suffrage, to equal rights, to school-based health, to women’s health.

“The women’s trade union leagues, national and state, are not only valuable because of support given to the workers, but because they make it possible for women other than wage-earners to identify themselves with working people, and thus give practical expression to their belief that with them and through them the realization of the ideals of democracy can be advanced.”

And yet, this is how she was portrayed by the head in the sand crowd (you will recognize them today):

Wald had been labeled a “radical” on many occasions—for her peace work during World War I, for her endorsement of Socialist candidates, for her association with radicals like Emma Goldman, for her defense of immigrant “aliens” and even for her neighborhood’s celebration of the success of the Russian Revolution. In 1919, however, in the wake of the American reaction to the rise of communism, Wald, with sixty-one other women and men, was listed in a document presented to the U.S. Judiciary which pointed to those who supposedly supported the German cause before WWI. The “Who’s Who in Pacifism” cited Wald as an “undesirable citizen” who was suspected of “pro-Bolshevik” sentiments. Nevertheless, Wald accepted an invitation to see communist Russia for herself. In 1924, she and several colleagues visited Russia as guests of the government to discuss public health and child welfare. She returned with a strong suggestion for the U.S. government to formally recognize Russia, as “a step of vital importance in our hope for better understanding and cooperation between the nations of the world.”

So when you see me ranting and raving about nursing and patient advocacy, know that I worked on both sides of Harlem, traveled with Wald’s ghost guiding my steps, and have at heart, her practical progressive idealism directing my advocacy efforts. Like Wald, I’m not a creative type, but I adapt the best practices and ideas to meet the challenges and needs. Like Wald, I love big, messy problems – like pandemic flu preparedness and government accountability and patient advocacy and – .

Unlike Wald, I’ve yet to find a sponsor, a patron and a base of supporters. Hello out there!