Draft:Mary Curtis Wheeler

Mary Curtis Wheeler was born in Brooklyn, New York, and finished her early education there. After her mother died, she lived with her relatives in Wisconsin for the rest of her childhood. After graduating from Ripon High School, she went on to Ripon College and graduated in 1890. She then relocated to Chicago and enrolled in the Illinois Training School for Nurses, where she earned her nursing degree in 1893. Her first job was as the superintendent of Elgin's Sherman Hospital. During this time, she took advanced classes at the University of Michigan, including a medical dissection course. In the fall of 1899, she moved to Quincy. She quickly rose to the position of superintendent at Blessing Hospital. Throughout her time in Quincy, she played a crucial role in the movement that transformed nursing education, resulted in the licensing and recognition of registered nurses in Illinois, and significantly enhanced the training provided to nurse candidates.

Wheeler played a pivotal role in revolutionizing the nursing education system through her active participation in the newly formed Illinois State Nurses’ Association.

The group held their first meeting in 1901, and soon thereafter they regularly met to work towards improving nursing education in Illinois. In 1903, the organization drafted their first bill, "An Act to Regulate the Practice of Professional Nursing of the Sick in the State of Illinois," and presented it to the Illinois state legislature.

In Springfield, Mary Wheeler among others in the delegation lobbied the legislators for the bill. The bill faced opposition from hospitals, physicians, correspondence schools, and church-related schools, who feared a loss of control over nurses. The bill was passed but then was vetoed in 1903 by the governor.

Following the veto, Wheeler worked in the Association’s legislative committee to create a revised bill that attempted to “cover all of the objections from the various constituencies” (Dittmer 2016). They reintroduced the revised bill in 1905. However, the bill was met with another veto, as the governor felt “it was unfair to people with no training but long experience” (Dittmer 2016).

The third bill, which Wheeler also helped revise, was finally passed in 1907. In the process of getting the bill passed, she not only lobbied in Springfield but also wrote letters to the editors of major Quincy newspapers. Appeasing those who had initially opposed the bill, she clarified in the letters that while the bill would force schools to follow a minimum standard, it would not interfere with religious societies or deny patients the right to have practical or non-professional nurses.

The passage of this bill marked a watershed moment in nursing education and regulation. Before its enactment, Illinois had fifty unregulated training schools and 65 hospitals in 1903. There were no set standards for the curriculum, graduation requirements, or admissions. Anybody could identify as a licensed professional nurse. The bill established a regulatory body to inspect and accredit training programs, allowing graduates to sit for a licensing exam and use the title "registered nurse" after.

As recognition for her work on this issue, Governor Charles S. Deneen appointed Mary Wheeler to the Illinois State Board of Examiners of Registered Nurses in 1908. With the board, she visited 87 different nursing schools throughout the state to inspect them for minimum standards. Sixty of the 87 schools submitted applications to be registered in the first year. Thirty-four schools–including Blessing–were successful and qualified to take the licensing exam and use the title "registered nurse."

Wheeler resigned as superintendent of Blessing Hospital and Training School in 1910, having served for 11 years. Her resignation was “accepted with regret by the Board of Lady Managers” (Dittmer 2016). She oversaw the hospital's growth and prosperity, regarded as an inspiration to her fellow nurses and everyone who worked at the hospital.

Throughout the last two decades of her life, she has dedicated herself to a variety of positions, continuing to improve nursing education. She was appointed superintendent of the Illinois Training School for Nurses in 1913, resigned in 1924, and later became general secretary of the Michigan State Nurses Association (1925-30). She was also the president of the American Society of Superintendents for Training Schools from 1913 to 1914, and she served on the American Nurses' Association's first Board of Directors for several years. In 1918, Wheeler published her book Nursing Technic, which in her preface she describes as “notes have been brought together with the hope that the teaching of the fundamentals of nursing technic may be more nearly standardized in Schools of Nursing” (Wheeler 1918). In 1940, she made her home in Florida. While the exact cause of her death is unknown, it is assumed she died of natural causes on September 29, 1944, and was buried in Valparaiso, Florida.