Creator |
Paul, Dan E., photographer. |
Title |
[Group portrait photograph of fourteen African American nurses and nursing students outside of Dr. J. H. Mudgett’s Private
Hospital and Training School for Nurses, 2030 N. 13th Street, Philadelphia] [graphic] / Dan E. Paul, commercial photography,
Bell Phone, 2139 N. 2nd Street, Philadelphia, Pa.
|
Publisher |
Philadelphia |
Publisher |
PA. Philadelphia. 1919 |
Date |
[1919] |
Physical Description |
1 photograph : gelatin silver mounted on board; mount 35 x 30 cm (13.75 x 11.75 in.) |
Description |
Group portrait depicts the women, including Helen Waller, posed in three rows on the steps outside the entryway to the hospital
and training school. Five woman stand in a line in the top and bottom rows and four women stand in a line in the middle row.
The women hold their arms to their sides or behind them and have plain expressions. The women in the bottom row wear white,
ankle-length dresses with long sleeves and collars, white stockings, and white shoes with heels. They also wear nurses caps
with the one of the woman in the middle trimmed with a thin black stripe along the edge, possibly “Miss Harris, super-intendant
of the nurses.” The women in the upper rows wear white, long-sleeved shirts, white apron dresses, and nurses caps. The sign
naming the hospital and school adorning the building is partially visible in the right. The figure who is Helen Waller, a
1919 graduate of the hospital is not known, but likely one of the women in the first row.
|
|
Dr. J. H. Mudgett’s Private Hospital and Training School for Nurses was established by New Hampshire-born white (per census
records) physician John H. Mudgett and chartered in 1919. Mudgett served as the medical director of surgery. In 1921, the
school was one of a number of nursing schools advertised in the “Evening Public Ledger” as offering “Free Tuition, Board,
Lodging, and a Nominal Fee” to be trained as a nurse. Mudgett, graduated Dartmouth Medical School in 1896 and resided in Philadelphia
as a physician by circa 1905. By 1925, he was listed as only a physician with no listing for the training school. Mudgett,
a member of the First African Baptist Church, died in 1945. At the time of his death he was in a multiracial marriage with
Adeline Mudgett (1889-1958), a former dressmaker. His race on his death certificate had been altered from white to “colored.”
Helen Waller (1897-1925) was one of the first nurse graduates of Mudgett’s Hospital in 1919. By 1924, she worked as a child
hygiene nurse before her death in 1925 from tuberculosis.
|
Notes |
Title supplied by cataloger. |
|
Date inferred from article about “Mudgett’s Hospital Has Its First Commencement,” Philadelphia Tribune, July 19, 1919. |
|
Name of photographer from photographer's stamp on verso. |
|
Manuscript note on verso: Helen Waller, 2020 Turner Street. |
|
See also complementary group portrait photographs - Education - M [P.2022.5.2 & 3]. |
Subject |
Harris, Miss, active 1919 -- Portraits. |
|
Waller, Helen, 1897-1925 -- Portraits. |
|
Dr. J. H. Mudgett’s Private Hospital and Training School for Nurses (Philadelphia, Pa.) |
|
African American nurses -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
|
African American students -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
|
African American women -- Education -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
|
Hospitals -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
|
Nursing schools -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
|
African American nursing schools. |
Genre |
Group portraits -- 1910-1920. |
|
Portrait photographs -- 1910-1920. |
|
Gelatin silver prints -- 1910-1920. |
Location |
Library Company of Philadelphia| Print Department| *group portrait photographs - education - Mudgett's Hospital [P.2022.5.1] |
Accession number |
P.2022.5.1 |