Laura Jane Addams was an American settlement activist, reformer, social worker, sociologist, public administrator, philosopher, and author. She was a leader in the history of social work and women's suffrage in the United States. Addams co-founded Hull House, one of America's most famous settlement houses, in Chicago, Illinois, providing extensive social services to poor, largely immigrant families. In 1910, Addams was awarded an honorary Master of Arts degree from Yale University, becoming the first woman to receive an honorary degree from the school. In 1920, she was a co-founder of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
Hull House was a settlement house in Chicago, Illinois, that was co-founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Located on the Near West Side of Chicago, Hull House, named after the original house's first owner Charles Jerald Hull, opened to serve recently arrived European immigrants. By 1911, Hull House had expanded to 13 buildings. In 1912, the Hull House complex was completed with the addition of a summer camp, the Bowen Country Club. With its innovative social, educational, and artistic programs, Hull House became the standard bearer for the movement; by 1920, it grew to approximately 500 settlement houses nationally.
Julia Clifford Lathrop was an American social reformer in the area of education, social policy, and children's welfare. As director of the United States Children's Bureau from 1912 to 1922, she was the first woman ever to head a United States federal bureau.
Judson University is a private Baptist university in Elgin, Illinois. It is affiliated with the American Baptist Churches USA. Judson was formed out of the liberal arts component of Northern Baptist Theological Seminary. When the seminary moved from Chicago to Lombard, Illinois, it was decided to make the college separate from the seminary. Originally known as Judson College, it was named after Adoniram Judson, the first American Baptist missionary to foreign shores. The university has campuses in Elgin and Rockford, Illinois, and a student body of approximately 1,300. Judson College became Judson University on August 28, 2007.
The settlement movement was a reformist social movement that began in the 1880s and peaked around the 1920s in the United Kingdom and the United States. Its goal was to bring the rich and the poor of society together in both physical proximity and social connection. Its main object was the establishment of "settlement houses" in poor urban areas, in which volunteer middle-class "settlement workers" would live, hoping to share knowledge and culture with, and alleviate the poverty of, their low-income neighbors. The settlement houses provided services such as daycare, English classes, and healthcare to improve the lives of the poor in these areas. The settlement movement also spawned educational/reform movements. Both in the UK and the US settlement workers worked to develop a unique activist form of sociology known as Settlement Sociology. This science of social reform movement is neglected in the history of sociology in favor of a teaching-, theory- and research university–based model.
National Louis University (NLU) is a private nonprofit university with its main campus in Chicago, Illinois. NLU enrolls undergraduate and graduate students in more than 60 programs across its four colleges. It has locations throughout the Chicago metropolitan area as well as a regional campus in Tampa, Florida, where it serves students from 13 counties in that state’s central region.
Ellen Gates Starr was an American social reformer and activist. With Jane Addams, she founded Chicago's Hull House, an adult education center, in 1889; the settlement house expanded to 13 buildings in the neighborhood.
Andrew MacLeish was a Scottish and American businessman.
John Huy Addams was a politician and businessman from the U.S. state of Illinois. Addams was born in Pennsylvania in 1822, where he married Sarah Weber (1817–1863). In 1844 the couple moved to Cedarville, Illinois, and he purchased the Cedar Creek Mill. Addams quickly became a successful businessman working as a director for two railroad companies and a bank president. He constructed a prominent Federal style home in 1854 which still stands today. He and his wife Sarah (Weber) Addams had nine children, including Alice Haldeman and social activist Jane Addams.
Sarah Alice Haldeman was an American craftswoman, banker and philanthropist. She was the sister of social activist Jane Addams and mother of Marcet Haldeman-Julius.
Julia Henrietta Gulliver was an American philosopher, educator and college president. She was only the second woman in America to receive a Ph.D. in philosophy and was a tireless advocate for increased female representation in higher education.
Dr. Cornelia De Bey was a Progressive Era reformer, homeopathic doctor, Chicago public school administrator, labor advocate, and leader in the women's suffrage movement. She worked with the famous Hull House community of social reformers, including Jane Addams, Julia Lathrop, Alice De Wolf Kellogg, and Ellen Gates Starr. She advocated for major school administration reform, exposing corruption, advocating for more democratic decision-making, and defending the unionization of teachers.
Mary Emilie Holmes was a 19th-century American geologist and educator who became the first woman to be elected a fellow of the Geological Society of America. She was also one of the cofounders of a seminary for young black women that evolved into Mary Holmes College, which was named in memory of her mother.
Louise DeKoven Bowen was an American philanthropist, civic leader, social reformer, and suffragist. She was born to a wealthy family and raised with a strong sense of noblesse oblige. She made substantial financial donations to numerous organizations, raised funds from her association with Chicago's elite families, and while not trained as a social worker, she served in the field as a competent and respected policy maker and administrator. She worked with the settlement movement at Hull House, court reform for youth via the Juvenile Protective Association, and numerous women's clubs and women's suffrage organizations. A primary passion of hers was the reform of dance halls in Chicago. At the end of her 94 years, she had provided care to the impoverished and disenfranchised through her extensive public service and activism, especially attending to "the welfare and betterment of women, children, and their families."
Eva Munson Smith was an American composer, poet, and author. She was the author of Woman in Sacred Song (1885), a representative work of what women have done in hymnology. She was the author of a large number of temperance songs and other works, which became very popular. Her poems appeared in Poets of America and other standard works. Her best known productions were "Woodland Warblings", "American Rifle Team March", and "I Will Not Leave You Comfortless".
Emma Adena Miller Rich was an American social worker, philanthropist, and activist. She was head resident of Hull House from 1935 to 1937, after the death of Jane Addams.
Adaline Emerson Thompson was an American benefactor, and educational worker and reformer. She served as president of the College Settlements Association.
Jessie Florence Binford, aka “the conscience of Chicago”, was a social worker who worked closely with Jane Addams at Hull House. Binford was the founder and executive director of the Juvenile Protective Association in 1916 and stayed for 32 years.
Phebe Temperance Sutliff (1859–1955) was an American educator who served as president of Rockford College in Illinois. Her life was devoted to scholarship, particularly investigation of historical and economic problems.
