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= Lillian Wald =

Lillian Wald was a pioneer in public health during the 1890s where she first saw the unsanitary conditions in the tenements in Manhattan, New York. The increase of immigrants contributed to the lack of medicine available in the area. She is also the founder of Henry Street Settlement and she is a well respected social reformer of the 20th century. Henry Street provided social services and instructions ranging from the English language to music. Wald also moved into the neighborhood and offered her assistance in health care with a small fee and she worked side by side with the industrial poor even when she came from a life of privilege. In 1902, she used her funds to hire a nurse to go around the neighborhood public schools. This brought attention to the Board of Education and its success was the reason why public schools hire nurses. By 1913, the Settlement expanded into 7 buildings and 2 satellite centers. Wald was an advocate for children, labor, immigrant, civil and women’s rights. She co-founded and became first president of the National Organization for Public Health Nursing. She also helped in founding Columbia University’s School of Nursing.

"She helped institute the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the United States Children’s Bureau, the National Child Labor Committee and the National Women’s Trade Union League. A champion of local causes such as Seward Park’s playground and global issues such as bans on child labor and access to health care, Wald encouraged all citizens to act on their own responsibility to all of humanity".

Early Life
Lillian Wald was born March 10, 1867 in Cincinnati, Ohio from a family of Jewish professionals. She grew up both in Cincinnati and Rochester, New York where she received a private school education. She abandoned her plans to attend Vassar college and after a few years of active social life, she attended the New York Hospital Training School for Nurses, from which she graduated in 1891. She worked as a nurse in the New York Juvenile Asylum for a whole year and trained under Woman’s Medical College where she was asked to organize a class home nursing for the poor immigrant families of New York’s Lower East Side. There she saw the horrible conditions of the tenements and it is also there where she decided to take on a path of making a difference - leading to her founding of Henry Street Settlement and the National Organization for Public Health Nursing.