This is the last in a series of four blog posts (listed below) by nurse and attorney Edie Brous that introduce readers to some of the many notable Black nurses of the past. We encourage readers to delve more deeply into these lives and their intersection with key aspects of nursing history, women’s history, and the long struggle against racist barriers.  

“Honoring Notable Black Nurses of History“

“Mahoney, Thoms, Franklin: Black Nurses and Reformers to Remember“

“The Nursing Work of Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman“

In this post, I will draw attention to three public health pioneers who overcame racial barriers to excel and create a path for those who followed.

Jessie Sleet Scales (1865-1956)

A public health pioneer, Jessie Sleet Scales graduated in 1895 from Provident Hospital and Training School in Chicago, America’s first Black-owned and -operated hospital. From there she went to Freedmen’s Hospital Training School at Howard University, Washington, D.C., for a special six-month course.

In her nursing career, Scales initially encountered rejection and racial barriers despite her training and a shortage of registered nurses. The Charity Organization Society in New York City hired her as a district nurse in 1900 to visit Black homes during the tuberculosis epidemic. She was given a two-month experimental trial, but did so well that she was kept on as a district nurse and visitor with the organization for nine years. Her supervisor was so impressed by Scales’ work that she submitted her report to the American Journal of Nursing in 1901. Here’s an excerpt:

“I beg to render to you a report of the work done by me as a district nurse among the colored people of New York City during the months of October and November. I have visited forty-one families and made 156 calls in connection with these families caring for nine cases of consumption, four cases of peritonitis, two cases of chickenpox, two cases of cancer, one case of diphtheria, two cases of heart disease, two cases of tumor, one case of gastric catarrh, two cases of pneumonia, four cases of rheumatism, and two cases of scalp wound. I have given baths, applied poultices, dressed wounds, washed and dressed newborn babies, cared for mothers.”

Her work inspired other organizations to hire Black public health nurses.

Frances Reed Elliott Davis (1883-1965)

Frances Reed Elliott Davis was born in North Carolina in 1883. She graduated from the Freedmen’s Hospital Training School when nursing board exams were given to students based on race. The examination given to white students was harder and more esteemed. Davis insisted on taking the exam with the white students and became the first Black student to pass the District of Columbia board of examination for nursing.

As with many other Black nurses, Davis worked in private duty nursing. Although she wanted to work with the Red Cross during World War I, the organization was not yet accepting Black nurses in 1916. However, she had a strong academic record, and was enrolled by the Red Cross in its rural nurse training program, and in 1917 she was sent to Tennessee to begin work. In 1918, she received a letter from the Red Cross stating that she had been the “first colored nurse to be enrolled in the Red Cross.”

During the influenza epidemic of 1918, Davis contracted a severe case of the flu herself, which left her with permanent heart damage. She took a position with the Detroit Department of Health in 1920 and remained there for many years. While there, Davis successfully lobbied Eleanor Roosevelt for support in establishing a childcare facility and organized the first training school for Black nurses in Michigan. She died in 1965, only a few days before the American Red Cross was to honor her at a national convention.

Aileen Cole Stewart (c. 1893-c.1997)

Aileen Cole Stewart, far left, at Camp Sherman, Ohio.

Also one of the first Black military nurses, Aileen Cole Stewart attended a three-year nursing diploma program at Freedmen’s Hospital Training School. She completed her examinations to become a nurse in 1917, the year the United States entered World War I. She applied to work with the U.S. army through the Red Cross at a time when the armed forces were segregated and only white nurses were assigned to active duty.

When the 1918 flu pandemic began, many returning soldiers and other Americans began dying of the flu, and nurses were called to service. When the Red Cross responded to the army surgeon general’s request for more nurses, Stewart volunteered and was commissioned as a first lieutenant in the Reserve Naval Corps. She was put through a rigorous training program, then sent with eight other Black nurses to Camp Sherman to take care of German prisoners of war and Black soldiers.

After the war, Stewart worked as a night supervisor at Booker T. Washington Sanitarium. The inpatient sanitarium was one of the first Black hospitals treating Black patients with tuberculosis. She then worked as a public health nurse for 34 years, retiring in 1956.

Stewart remained a Red Cross volunteer for the rest of her life, and after almost 50 years of nursing, wrote an article about her experiences in the American Journal of Nursing called “Ready to Serve.”

Edie Brous, JD, MPH, MS, RN, is a lawyer and nurse in New York City and Pennsylvania.