Hobson, Elizabeth Christophers (1831–1912)

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Hobson, Elizabeth Christophers (1831–1912)

American social-welfare worker. Born Elizabeth Christophers Kimball, Nov 22, 1831, on Long Island farm outside Brooklyn, NY; died June 11, 1912, in Bar Harbor, Maine; dau. of Elijah Huntington Kimball (lawyer) and Sarah (Wetmore) Kimball; m. Joseph Hobson (banker), Dec 4, 1850 (died 1881).

Became chair of committee that inspected Bellevue Hospital, NY (1872), and out of which later grew the State Charities Aid Association; wrote report on hospital conditions which led to founding of Bellevue Training School for Nurses (1873), 1st institution in US to use Nightingale plan to train nurses; became chair of State Charities Aid Association's pioneering committee on first aid to the injured (1882); coconducted study on condition of black women in the South (mid–1880s) which was integral in founding of Southern Industrial Classes, a pilot program in Norfolk, VA, for introducing practical education into black schools and of which she remained president throughout its existence (until 1912); published Recollections of a Happy Life (1916).

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