Jane AddamsWorld History Honors

ScrapbookMaisie O’Meara

Childhood

• Born September 6, 1860• Born in Cedarville, Illinois• Second youngest of nine

children• Had a congenital spine

defect which did not allow her to do much physical activity when she was young

Jane Addams as a child

Spine defect

Childhood

• Father was a well-off local political leader

• Mother died when she was two years old

• Father remarried• Stepmother brought

two step-siblings to the family

• Very devoted to father

Jane’s father

Jane’s father and stepmother

Education

• Attended Rockford Female Seminary

• Developed strong leadership skills

• Graduated in 1881• Valedictorian of a class

of seventeen

Jane as a student

Education

• Received bachelor’s degree the next year when school became Rockford College for Women

• Father encouraged her to pursue higher education

• Began to study medicine

Younger Jane Addams

Medical Symbol

Problems as a Young Woman

• Parents thought she had enough education and were afraid she would never get married

• Parents took Jane and her friends on a tour throughout Europe for almost two years

• Became very ill during this trip

Europe

Problems as a Young Woman• Father died when she

returned from trip• Became very depressed

and even more ill• Could not walk or move

without pain• Had surgery to fix

curvature of her spine• Was put into a back

harness for a year after surgery and could not move

Jane depressed

Curvature of the spine

Work

• After recovering from surgery, she went back to Europe

• Went sightseeing with friends

• Introduced to works of Toynbee Hall- house for slums in London when she was 27 years old

↕ Toynbee Hall

Work• This encouraged Jane and

friend Ellen G. Starr to create similar house in Chicago

• 1889- Jane and Ellen leased a house from Charles Hull

• Two young women moved in with a purpose to create a center that would help people in need

House leased from Charles Hull

Ellen G. Starr

Hull House

• Jane and Ellen gave speeches about their purpose

• Raised money to develop house

• Convinced women to help

Hull House

Hull House help

Hull House

• Cared for children• Cared for the sick• By second year, Hull

House was helping 2,000 people every week

Nursery

Children at the Hull House

A Day at the Hull House

• Morning– Kindergarten classes

• Afternoon– Club meetings for older

children

• Evening– More clubs for adults– Night class for adults

Club meeting

Class at the Hull House

Developments to the Hull House

• Art Gallery• Public Kitchen• Coffee House• Gymnasium• Swimming Pool• Boarding Club for Girls

Coffee House

Wrestlers in the gymnasium

Developments to the Hull House

• Book Bindery• Art Studio• Musical School• Drama Group• Library• Employment Bureau• Labor Museum

Library

Musical School

More Work• Worked to

– End poverty– Improve labor conditions

• Examined child labor laws, factory inspection system, and the juvenile justice system

– Protect immigrants from exploitation

– Limit working hours for women

– Make school for children mandatory

– Improve industrial safety

Child labor

Women labor

More Work• 1911- Became first vice

president of the National American Woman Suffrage Association

• 1912- Campaigned for Theodore Roosevelt and the Progressive Party

• Wrote a few books– Twenty Years at Hull House

• Autobiography• Great success

– Newer Idols of Peace– Peace and Bread in Time of

War

National American Women Suffrage Association

Twenty Years at Hull House

Accomplishments• 1905- Appointed to

Chicago’s Board of Education and made chairman of the School Management Committee

• 1909- Became first woman president of the National Conference of Charities and Corrections

• 1910- Was given the first honorary degree ever given to a woman from Yale University

Jane Addams

Accomplishments

• 1915- Accepted chairmanship of the Women’s Peace Party

• President of Women's International League for Peace and Freedom until 1929

• 1931- Nobel Peace Prize

Women’s Peace Party

Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom

Last Years

• Had a heart attack in 1936 and never fully recovered

• Died May 21, 1935- three days after doctors discovered she had cancer

• Funeral took place in the Hull House courtyard

Jane Addams’s funeral

Jane Addams’s burial site

Legacy• Remembered as first

social worker• Strong feminist• One of the most famous

woman activists in the United States

• Jane Addams Hull House Association- organization that has established several social service centers in Chicago today

“Nothing could be worse than the fear that one had given up too soon, and left one unexpended effort that might have saved the world.”

- Jane Addams