Jane Addams

On this date – May 21 – 90 years ago, American woman Jane Addams died. She struggled with spiritual issues, perhaps because of the suffering that she saw among Chicago’s immigrants in the late 19th century, but her remarkable contribution is that she tried to DO something about it by establishing the settlement house known as Hull-House (hyphenated at that time). What a beehive of a place H-H was! A safe haven for immigrants of every nationality, especially women and babies, a learning, encouraging environment in everything from cooking to art, from music to the English language, open and free to all, a beautiful and safe place to learn and thrive. Miss Addams fell out of popular favor during WWI because she longed for peace but was one of the few women invited to attend the peace accords that ended that war. In 1931, Miss Addams received the Nobel Peace prize.

If you’d like to learn more about Jane Addams in an enjoyable, storied setting, read my book Where Home Is, the first part of which takes place at Hull-House and features my fictional heroine Dr. Katherine Davis interacting with Miss Addams as Dr. Davis interns at Hull-House’s infirmary (also fictional). Everything – really, everything – you read about Miss Addams in Where Home Is is factual, taken from her many biographies.

You can buy a little history and a lot of inspiration for $3.24 from the Kindle store on Amazon. Go to Hasley’s Book Store at the top of my website and click on the cover of Where Home Is to take you there. (Btw, as an added bonus, that’s Hull-House on the front cover.)