
Laura Jane Addams (September 6, 1860May 21, 1935) was an American
settlement activist,
reformer, social worker,
sociologist,
public administrator
Public administration, or public policy and administration refers to "the management of public programs", or the "translation of politics into the reality that citizens see every day",Kettl, Donald and James Fessler. 2009. ''The Politics of the ...
, philosopher, and author. She was a leader in the history of
social work
Social work is an academic discipline and practice-based profession concerned with meeting the basic needs of individuals, families, groups, communities, and society as a whole to enhance their individual and collective well-being. Social wo ...
and
women's suffrage
Women's suffrage is the women's rights, right of women to Suffrage, vote in elections. Several instances occurred in recent centuries where women were selectively given, then stripped of, the right to vote. In Sweden, conditional women's suffra ...
. In 1889, Addams co-founded
Hull House
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 Hul ...
, one of America's most famous
settlement house
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 an ...
s, in
Chicago, Illinois
Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...
, providing extensive social services to poor, largely immigrant families. Philosophically a "radical
pragmatist", she was arguably the first woman
public philosopher in the United States. In the
Progressive Era
The Progressive Era (1890s–1920s) was a period in the United States characterized by multiple social and political reform efforts. Reformers during this era, known as progressivism in the United States, Progressives, sought to address iss ...
, when even presidents such as
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. (October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), also known as Teddy or T.R., was the 26th president of the United States, serving from 1901 to 1909. Roosevelt previously was involved in New York (state), New York politics, incl ...
and
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was the 28th president of the United States, serving from 1913 to 1921. He was the only History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democrat to serve as president during the Prog ...
identified themselves as reformers and might be seen as social activists, Addams was one of the most prominent reformers.
An advocate for
world peace
World peace is the concept of an ideal state of peace within and among all people and nations on Earth. Different cultures, religions, philosophies, and organizations have varying concepts on how such a state would come about.
Various relig ...
, and recognized as the founder of the social work profession in the United States, in 1931 Addams became the first American woman to be awarded the
Nobel Peace Prize
The Nobel Peace Prize (Swedish language, Swedish and ) is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the Will and testament, will of Sweden, Swedish industrialist, inventor, and armaments manufacturer Alfred Nobel, along with the prizes in Nobe ...
. Earlier, Addams was awarded an honorary Master of Arts degree from
Yale University
Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...
in 1910, 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
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is an American nonprofit civil rights organization founded in 1920. ACLU affiliates are active in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. The budget of the ACLU in 2024 was $383 million.
T ...
(ACLU).
Addams helped America address and focus on issues that were of concern to mothers or extensions of the domestic-work assigned to women, such as the needs of children, local public health, and world peace. In her essay "Utilization of Women in City Government", Addams noted the connection between the workings of government and the household, stating that many departments of government, such as sanitation and the schooling of children, could be traced back to traditional women's roles in the private sphere. When she died in 1935, Addams was the best-known female public figure in the United States.
Early life

Born in
Cedarville, Illinois,
Jane Addams was the youngest of eight children born into a prosperous northern Illinois family of
English-American
English Americans (also known as Anglo-Americans) are Americans whose ancestry originates wholly or partly in England. In the 2020 United States census, English Americans were the largest group in the United States with 46.6 million Americ ...
descent which traced back to colonial Pennsylvania.
[Linn, James Weber. ''Jane Addams: A Biography'',]
Google Books
, University of Illinois Press: 2000, p. 4, (). Retrieved August 20, 2007. In 1863, when Addams was two years old, her mother, Sarah Addams (
née
The birth name is the name of the person given upon their birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name or to the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a births registe ...
Weber), died while pregnant with her ninth child. Thereafter Addams was cared for mostly by her older sisters. By the time Addams was eight, four of her siblings had died: three in infancy and one at the age of 16.
[Fox, Richard Wrightman and Kloppenberg, James T. ''A Companion to American Thought'',]
Google Books
, Blackwell Publishing: 1995, p. 14, (). Retrieved August 20, 2007.
Addams spent her childhood playing outdoors, reading indoors, and attending
Sunday school
]
A Sunday school, sometimes known as a Sabbath school, is an educational institution, usually Christianity, Christian in character and intended for children or neophytes.
Sunday school classes usually precede a Sunday church service and are u ...
. When she was four she contracted
tuberculosis
Tuberculosis (TB), also known colloquially as the "white death", or historically as consumption, is a contagious disease usually caused by ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can al ...
of the spine, known as
Potts's disease, which caused a curvature in her spine and lifelong health problems. This made it complicated as a child to function with the other children, considering she had a limp and could not run as well. As a child, she thought she was ugly and later remembered wanting not to embarrass her father, when he was dressed in his Sunday best, by walking down the street with him.
Jane Addams adored her father,
John H. Addams, when she was a child, as she made clear in the stories in her memoir, ''Twenty Years at Hull House'' (1910).
He was a founding member of the Illinois
Republican Party, served as an
Illinois State Senator
The Illinois Senate is the upper chamber of the Illinois General Assembly, the legislative branch of the government of the State of Illinois in the United States. The body was created by the first state constitution adopted in 1818. Under th ...
(1855–70), and supported his friend
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th president of the United States, serving from 1861 until Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, his assassination in 1865. He led the United States through the American Civil War ...
in his candidacies for senator (1854) and the presidency (1860). He kept a letter from Lincoln in his desk, and Addams loved to look at it as a child. Her father was an agricultural businessman with large timber, cattle, and agricultural holdings; flour and timber mills and a wool factory. He was the president of The Second National Bank of
Freeport, Illinois
Freeport is the largest city in Stephenson County, Illinois, United States, and its county seat. The population was 23,973 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, and the mayor of Freeport is Jodi Miller, elected in 2017. Freeport is k ...
. He remarried in 1868 when Addams was eight years old. His second wife was Anna Hosteler Haldeman, the widow of a miller in Freeport.
During her childhood, Addams had big dreams of doing something useful in the world. As a voracious reader, she became interested in the poor from her reading of
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English novelist, journalist, short story writer and Social criticism, social critic. He created some of literature's best-known fictional characters, and is regarded by ...
. Inspired by his works and by her own mother's kindness to the Cedarville poor, Addams decided to become a doctor so that she could live and work among the poor.
Addams's father encouraged her to pursue higher education but close to home. She was eager to attend the new college for women,
Smith College
Smith College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts Women's colleges in the United States, women's college in Northampton, Massachusetts, United States. It was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smit ...
in Massachusetts; but her father required her to attend nearby Rockford Female Seminary (now
Rockford University
Rockford University is a private university in Rockford, Illinois, United States. It was founded in 1847 as Rockford Female Seminary and changed its name to Rockford College in 1892, and to Rockford University in 2013.
History
Beginning
Roc ...
), in
Rockford, Illinois
Rockford is a city in Winnebago County, Illinois, Winnebago and Ogle County, Illinois, Ogle counties in the U.S. state of Illinois. Located in far northern Illinois on the banks of the Rock River (Mississippi River tributary), Rock River, Rockfor ...
.
Her experience at Rockford put her in a first wave of U.S. women to receive a college education. She excelled in this all women environment. She edited the college newspaper, was the valedictorian, participated in the debate club and led the class of 1881. Addams recognized that she and others who were engaged in post secondary education would have new opportunities and challenges. She expressed this in ''Bread Givers'' (1880), a speech she gave her junior year. She noted the "change which has taken place... in the ambition and aspirations of women."
In the process of developing their intellect and direct labor, something new was emerging. Educated women of her generation wished "not to be a man nor like a man" but claim "the same right to independent thought and action." Each young woman was gaining "a new confidence in her possibilities, and a fresher hope in her steady progress."
[ At 20, Addams recognized a changing cultural environment and was learning the skills at Rockford to lead the future settlement movement.
Whilst at Rockford, her readings of ]Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle (4 December 17955 February 1881) was a Scottish essayist, historian, and philosopher. Known as the "Sage writing, sage of Chelsea, London, Chelsea", his writings strongly influenced the intellectual and artistic culture of the V ...
, John Ruskin
John Ruskin (8 February 1819 20 January 1900) was an English polymath a writer, lecturer, art historian, art critic, draughtsman and philanthropist of the Victorian era. He wrote on subjects as varied as art, architecture, Critique of politic ...
, Leo Tolstoy
Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy Tolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; ,Throughout Tolstoy's whole life, his name was written as using Reforms of Russian orthography#The post-revolution re ...
and others became significant influences. After graduating from Rockford in 1881, with a collegiate certificate and membership in Phi Beta Kappa
The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States. It was founded in 1776 at the College of William & Mary in Virginia. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal arts and sciences, ...
, she still hoped to attend Smith to earn a proper B.A. That summer, her father died unexpectedly from a sudden case of appendicitis
Appendicitis is inflammation of the Appendix (anatomy), appendix. Symptoms commonly include right lower abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, fever and anorexia (symptom), decreased appetite. However, approximately 40% of people do not have these t ...
. Each child inherited roughly $50,000 (equivalent to $ in 2016).
That fall, Addams, her sister Alice, Alice's husband Harry, and their stepmother, Anna Haldeman Addams, moved to Philadelphia so that the three young people could pursue medical educations. Harry was already trained in medicine and did further studies at the University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania (Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. One of nine colonial colleges, it was chartered in 1755 through the efforts of f ...
. Jane and Alice completed their first year of medical school at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, but Jane's health problems, a spinal operation and a nervous breakdown
A mental disorder, also referred to as a mental illness, a mental health condition, or a psychiatric disability, is a behavioral or mental pattern that causes significant distress or impairment of personal functioning. A mental disorder is ...
prevented her from completing the degree. She was filled with sadness at her failure. Her stepmother Anna was also ill, so the entire family canceled their plans to stay two years and returned to Cedarville. her brother-in-law Harry performed surgery on her back, to straighten it. He then advised that she not pursue studies but, instead, travel. In August 1883, she set off for a two-year tour of Europe with her stepmother, traveling some of the time with friends and family who joined them. Addams decided that she did not have to become a doctor to be able to help the poor.
Upon her return home in June 1887, she lived with her stepmother in Cedarville and spent winters with her in Baltimore. Addams, still filled with vague ambition, sank into depression, unsure of her future and feeling useless leading the conventional life expected of a well-to-do young woman. She wrote long letters to her friend from Rockford Seminary, Ellen Gates Starr
Ellen Gates Starr (March 19, 1859 – February 10, 1940) 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 i ...
, mostly about Christianity and books but sometimes about her despair.
Her nephew was James Weber Linn (1876–1939) who taught English at the University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...
and served in the Illinois General Assembly
The Illinois General Assembly is the legislature of the U.S. state of Illinois. It has two chambers, the Illinois House of Representatives and the Illinois Senate. The General Assembly was created by the first state constitution adopted in ...
. Linn also wrote books and newspaper articles.
Settlement house
Meanwhile, Addams gathered inspiration from what she read. Fascinated by the early Christians and Tolstoy's book '' My Religion'', she was baptized a Christian in the Cedarville Presbyterian Church in the summer of 1886. Reading Giuseppe Mazzini
Giuseppe Mazzini (, ; ; 22 June 1805 – 10 March 1872) was an Italian politician, journalist, and activist for the unification of Italy (Risorgimento) and spearhead of the Italian revolutionary movement. His efforts helped bring about the ...
's ''Duties of Man'', she began to be inspired by the idea of democracy
Democracy (from , ''dēmos'' 'people' and ''kratos'' 'rule') is a form of government in which political power is vested in the people or the population of a state. Under a minimalist definition of democracy, rulers are elected through competitiv ...
as a social ideal. Yet she felt confused about her role as a woman. John Stuart Mill
John Stuart Mill (20 May 1806 – 7 May 1873) was an English philosopher, political economist, politician and civil servant. One of the most influential thinkers in the history of liberalism and social liberalism, he contributed widely to s ...
's ''The Subjection of Women
''The Subjection of Women'' is an essay by English philosopher, political economist and civil servant John Stuart Mill published in 1869, with ideas he developed jointly with his wife Harriet Taylor Mill. J.S. Mill submitted the finished manus ...
'' made her question the social pressures on a woman to marry and devote her life to family.
In the summer of 1887, Addams read in a magazine about the new idea of starting a settlement house
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 an ...
. She decided to visit the world's first, Toynbee Hall, in London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
. She and several friends, including Ellen Gates Starr
Ellen Gates Starr (March 19, 1859 – February 10, 1940) 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 i ...
, traveled in Europe from December 1887 through the summer of 1888. After watching a bullfight
Bullfighting is a physical contest that involves a bullfighter attempting to subdue, immobilize, or kill a bull, usually according to a set of rules, guidelines, or cultural expectations.
There are several variations, including some forms wh ...
in Madrid
Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...
, fascinated by what she saw as an exotic tradition, Addams condemned this fascination and her inability to feel outraged at the suffering of the horses and bulls. At first, Addams told no one about her dream to start a settlement house; but, she felt increasingly guilty for not acting on her dream. Believing that sharing her dream might help her to act on it, she told Ellen Gates Starr. Starr loved the idea and agreed to join Addams in starting a settlement house.
Addams and another friend traveled to London without Starr, who was busy. Visiting Toynbee Hall, Addams was enchanted. She described it as "a community of University men who live there, have their recreation clubs and society all among the poor people, yet, in the same style in which they would live in their own circle. It is so free of 'professional doing good,' so unaffectedly sincere and so productive of good results in its classes and libraries seems perfectly ideal." Addams's dream of the classes mingling socially to mutual benefit, as they had in early Christian circles seemed embodied in the new type of institution.
The settlement house as Addams discovered was a space within which unexpected cultural connections could be made and where the narrow boundaries of culture, class, and education could be expanded. They doubled as community arts centers and social service facilities. They laid the foundations for American civil society, a neutral space within which different communities and ideologies could learn from each other and seek common grounds for collective action. The role of the settlement house was an "unending effort to make culture and 'the issue of things' go together." The unending effort was the story of her own life, a struggle to reinvigorate her own culture by reconnecting with diversity and conflict of the immigrant communities in America's cities and with the necessities of social reform.
Hull House
In 1889 Addams and her college friend and paramour Ellen Gates Starr
Ellen Gates Starr (March 19, 1859 – February 10, 1940) 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 i ...
co-founded Hull House
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 Hul ...
, a settlement house in Chicago. The run-down mansion had been built by Charles Hull in 1856 and needed repairs and upgrading. Addams at first paid for all of the capital expenses (repairing the roof of the porch, repainting the rooms, buying furniture) and most of the operating costs. However gifts from individuals supported the House beginning in its first year and Addams was able to reduce the proportion of her contributions, although the annual budget grew rapidly. Some wealthy women became long-term donors to the House, including Helen Culver, who managed her first cousin Charles Hull's estate, and who eventually allowed the contributors to use the house rent-free. Other contributors were Louise DeKoven Bowen, Mary Rozet Smith, Mary Wilmarth, and others.
Addams and Starr were the first two occupants of the house, which would later become the residence of about 25 women. At its height, Hull House was visited each week by some 2,000 people. Hull House was a center for research, empirical analysis, study, and debate, as well as a pragmatic center for living in and establishing good relations with the neighborhood. Among the aims of Hull House was to give privileged, educated young people contact with the real life of the majority of the population. Residents of Hull House conducted investigations on housing, midwifery
Midwifery is the health science and health profession that deals with pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period (including care of the newborn), in addition to the sexual and reproductive health of women throughout their lives. In many cou ...
, fatigue, tuberculosis, typhoid
Typhoid fever, also known simply as typhoid, is a disease caused by ''Salmonella enterica'' serotype Typhi bacteria, also called ''Salmonella'' Typhi. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often ther ...
, garbage collection, cocaine, and truancy
Truancy is any intentional, unjustified, unauthorized, or illegal absence from compulsory education. It is a deliberate absence by a student's own free will and usually does not refer to legitimate excused absences, such as ones related to medic ...
. The core Hull House residents were well-educated women bound together by their commitment to labour unions, the National Consumers League
The National Consumers League, founded in 1899, is an American consumer organization. The National Consumers League is a private, nonprofit advocacy group representing consumers on marketplace and workplace issues. The NCL provides government, bu ...
and the suffrage movement. Dr. Harriett Alleyne Rice joined Hull House to provide medical treatment for poor families. Its facilities included a night school for adults, clubs for older children, a public kitchen, an art gallery
An art gallery is a room or a building in which visual art is displayed. In Western cultures from the mid-15th century, a gallery was any long, narrow covered passage along a wall, first used in the sense of a place for art in the 1590s. The long ...
, a gym
A gym, short for gymnasium (: gymnasiums or gymnasia), is an indoor venue for exercise and sports. The word is derived from the ancient Greek term " gymnasion". They are commonly found in athletic and fitness centres, and as activity and learn ...
, a girls' club, a bathhouse, a book bindery, a music school
A music school is an educational institution specialized in the study, training, and research of music. Such an institution can also be known as a school of music, music academy, music faculty, college of music, music department (of a larger in ...
, a drama group and a theater, apartments, a library, meeting rooms for discussion, clubs, an employment bureau, and a lunchroom. Her adult night school was a forerunner of the continuing education
Continuing education is the education undertaken after initial education for either personal or professional reasons. The term is used mainly in the United States and Canada.
Recognized forms of post-secondary learning activities within the d ...
classes offered by many universities today. In addition to making available social services and cultural events for the largely immigrant population of the neighborhood, Hull House afforded an opportunity for young social workers to acquire training. Eventually, Hull House became a 13-building settlement complex, which included a playground and a summer camp (known as Bowen Country Club).
One aspect of the Hull House that was very important to Jane Addams was the Art Program. The art program at Hull House allowed Addams to challenge the system of industrialized education, which "fitted" the individual to a specific job or position. She wanted the house to provide a space, time and tools to encourage people to think independently. She saw art as the key to unlocking the diversity of the city through collective interaction, mutual self-discovery, recreation and the imagination. Art was integral to her vision of community, disrupting fixed ideas and stimulating the diversity and interaction on which a healthy society depends, based on a continual rewriting of cultural identities through variation and interculturalism
Interculturalism is a political movement that supports cross-cultural dialogue and challenging self-segregation tendencies within cultures.John Nagle, Multiculturalism's Double-Bind: Creating Inclusivity Cosmopolitanism and Difference. Ashgate Pu ...
.
With funding from Edward Butler, Addams opened an art exhibition and studio space as one of the first additions to Hull House. On the first floor of the new addition there was a branch of the Chicago Public Library
The Chicago Public Library (CPL) is the public library system that serves the Chicago, City of Chicago in the U.S. state of Illinois. It consists of 81 locations, including a central library, three regional libraries, and branches distributed thr ...
, and the second was the Butler Art Gallery, which featured recreations of famous artwork as well as the work of local artists. Studio space within the art gallery provided both Hull House residents and the entire community with the opportunity to take art classes or to come in and hone their craft whenever they liked. As Hull House grew, and the relationship with the neighborhood deepened, that opportunity became less of a comfort to the poor and more of an outlet of expression and exchange of different cultures and diverse communities. Art and culture was becoming a bigger and more important part of the lives of immigrants within the 19th ward, and soon children caught on to the trend. These working-class children were offered instruction in all forms and levels of art. Places such as the Butler Art Gallery or the Bowen Country Club often hosted these classes, but more informal lessons would often be taught outdoors. Addams, with the help of Ellen Gates Starr, founded the Chicago Public School Art Society (CPSAS) in response to the positive reaction the art classes for children caused. The CPSAS provided public schools with reproductions of world-renowned pieces of art, hired artists to teach children how to create art, and also took the students on field trips to Chicago's many art museums.
Near west side neighborhood
The Hull House neighborhood was a mix of European ethnic groups that had immigrated to Chicago around the start of the 20th century. That mix was the ground where Hull House's inner social and philanthropic elitists tested their theories and challenged the establishment. The ethnic mix is recorded by the Bethlehem-Howard Neighborhood Center: "Germans and Jews resided south of that inner core (south of Twelfth Street) ... The Greek delta formed by Harrison, Halsted Street
Halsted Street is a major north-south street in the U.S. city of Chicago, Illinois.
Location
In Chicago's grid system, Halsted Street marks 800 West, west of State Street, from Grace Street (3800 N) in Lakeview south to the city limits ...
, and Blue Island Streets served as a buffer to the Irish residing to the north and the French Canadians to the northwest."[Hull House Museum] Italians resided within the inner core of the Hull House Neighborhood ... from the river on the east end, on out to the western ends of what came to be known as Little Italy
Little Italy is the catch-all name for an ethnic enclave populated primarily by Italians or people of Italian ancestry, usually in an Urban area, urban neighborhood. The concept of "Little Italy" holds many different aspects of the Italian cul ...
. Greeks
Greeks or Hellenes (; , ) are an ethnic group and nation native to Greece, Greek Cypriots, Cyprus, Greeks in Albania, southern Albania, Greeks in Turkey#History, Anatolia, parts of Greeks in Italy, Italy and Egyptian Greeks, Egypt, and to a l ...
and Jews, along with the remnants of other immigrant groups, began their exodus from the neighborhood in the early 20th century. Only Italians continued as an intact and thriving community through the Great Depression, World War II, and well beyond the ultimate d three "ethical principles" for social settlements: "to teach by example, to practice cooperation, and to practice social democracy, that is, egalitarian, or democratic, social relations across class lines." Thus Hull House offered a comprehensive program of civic, cultural, recreational, and educational activities and attracted admiring visitors from all over the world, including William Lyon Mackenzie King
William Lyon Mackenzie King (December 17, 1874 – July 22, 1950) was a Canadian statesman and politician who was the tenth prime minister of Canada for three non-consecutive terms from 1921 to 1926, 1926 to 1930, and 1935 to 1948. A Liberal ...
, a graduate student from Harvard University who later became prime minister of Canada. In the 1890s Julia Lathrop
Julia Clifford Lathrop (June 29, 1858 – April 15, 1932) was an Americans, 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 th ...
, Florence Kelley
Florence Molthrop Kelley (September 12, 1859 – February 17, 1932) was an American social and political reformer who coined the term wage abolitionism. Her work against sweatshops and for the minimum wage, eight-hour workdays, and children's ...
, and other residents of the house made it a world center of social reform activity. Hull House used the latest methodology (pioneering in statistical mapping) to study overcrowding, truancy, typhoid fever, cocaine, children's reading, newsboys, infant mortality, and midwifery. Starting with efforts to improve the immediate neighborhood, the Hull House group became involved in city and statewide campaigns for better housing, improvements in public welfare, stricter child-labor laws, and protection of working women. Addams brought in prominent visitors from around the world and had close links with leading Chicago intellectuals and philanthropists. In 1912, she helped start the new Progressive Party and supported the presidential campaign of Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. (October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), also known as Teddy or T.R., was the 26th president of the United States, serving from 1901 to 1909. Roosevelt previously was involved in New York (state), New York politics, incl ...
.
"Addams' philosophy combined feminist sensibilities with an unwavering commitment to social improvement through cooperative efforts. Although she sympathized with feminists, socialists, and pacifists, Addams refused to be labeled. This refusal was pragmatic rather than ideological."
Emphasis on children
Hull House stressed the importance of the role of children in the Americanization process of new immigrants. This philosophy also fostered the play movement and the research and service fields of leisure, youth, and human services. Addams argued in ''The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets'' (1909) that play and recreation programs are needed because cities are destroying the spirit of youth. Hull House featured multiple programs in art and drama, kindergarten classes, boys' and girls' clubs, language classes, reading groups, college extension courses, along with public baths, a gymnasium, a labor museum and playground, all within a free-speech atmosphere. They were all designed to foster democratic cooperation, collective action and downplay individualism. She helped pass the first model tenement code and the first factory laws.
Along with her colleagues from Hull House, in 1901 Jane Addams founded what would become the Juvenile Protective Association. JPA provided the first probation officers for the first Juvenile Court in the United States until this became a government function. From 1907 until the 1940s, JPA engaged in many studies examining such subjects as racism, child labor and exploitation, drug abuse and prostitution
Prostitution is a type of sex work that involves engaging in sexual activity in exchange for payment. The definition of "sexual activity" varies, and is often defined as an activity requiring physical contact (e.g., sexual intercourse, no ...
in Chicago and their effects on child development. Through the years, their mission has now become improving the social and emotional well-being and functioning of vulnerable children so they can reach their fullest potential at home, in school, and in their communities.
Documenting social illnesses
Addams and her colleagues documented the communal geography of typhoid fever and reported that poor workers were bearing the brunt of the illness. She identified the political corruption and business avarice that caused the city bureaucracy to ignore health, sanitation, and building codes. Linking environmental justice
Environmental justice is a social movement that addresses injustice that occurs when poor or marginalized communities are harmed by hazardous waste, resource extraction, and other land uses from which they do not benefit. The movement has gene ...
and municipal reform, she eventually defeated the bosses and fostered a more equitable distribution of city services and modernized inspection practices. Addams spoke of the "undoubted powers of public recreation to bring together the classes of a community in the keeping them apart." Addams worked with the Chicago Board of Health and served as the first vice-president of the Playground Association of America.
Emphasis on prostitution
In 1912, Addams published ''A New Conscience and Ancient Evil'', about prostitution. This book was extremely popular. Addams believed that prostitution was a result of kidnapping only. Her book later inspired Stella Wynne Herron's 1916 short story ''Shoes'', which Lois Weber adapted into a groundbreaking 1916 film of the same name.
Feminine ideals
Addams and her colleagues originally intended Hull House as a transmission device to bring the values of the college-educated high culture to the masses, including the Efficiency Movement, a major movement in industrial nations in the early 20th century that sought to identify and eliminate waste in the economy and society, and to develop and implement best practices. However, over time, the focus changed from bringing art and culture to the neighborhood (as evidenced in the construction of the Butler Building) to responding to the needs of the community by providing childcare, educational opportunities, and large meeting spaces. Hull House became more than a proving ground for the new generation of college-educated, professional women: it also became part of the community in which it was founded, and its development reveals a shared history.
Addams called on women, especially middle-class women with leisure time and energy as well as rich philanthropists, to exercise their civic duty to become involved in municipal affairs as a matter of "civic housekeeping". Addams thereby enlarged the concept of civic duty to include roles for women beyond motherhood (which involved child rearing). Women's lives revolved around "responsibility, care, and obligation", which represented the source of women's power. This notion provided the foundation for the municipal or civil housekeeping role that Addams defined and gave added weight to the women's suffrage movement that Addams supported. Addams argued that women, as opposed to men, were trained in the delicate matters of human welfare and needed to build upon their traditional roles of housekeeping to be civic housekeepers. Enlarged housekeeping duties involved reform efforts regarding poisonous sewage, impure milk (which often carried tuberculosis), smoke-laden air, and unsafe factory conditions. Addams led the "garbage wars"; in 1894 she became the first woman appointed as sanitary inspector of Chicago's 19th Ward. With the help of the Hull House Women's Club, within a year over 1,000 health department violations were reported to city council and garbage collection reduced death and disease.
Addams had long discussions with philosopher John Dewey
John Dewey (; October 20, 1859 – June 1, 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and Education reform, educational reformer. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century.
The overridi ...
in which they redefined democracy in terms of pragmatism and civic activism, with an emphasis more on duty and less on rights. The two leading perspectives that distinguished Addams and her coalition from the modernizers more concerned with efficiency
Efficiency is the often measurable ability to avoid making mistakes or wasting materials, energy, efforts, money, and time while performing a task. In a more general sense, it is the ability to do things well, successfully, and without waste.
...
were the need to extend to social and economic life the democratic structures and practices that had been limited to the political sphere, as in Addams's programmatic support of trade unions and second, their call for a new social ethic to supplant the individualist outlook as being no longer adequate in modern society.
Addams's construction of womanhood involved daughterhood, sexuality, wifehood, and motherhood. In both of her autobiographical volumes, ''Twenty Years at Hull-House'' (1910) and ''The Second Twenty Years at Hull-House'' (1930), Addams's gender constructions parallel the Progressive-Era ideology she championed. In ''A New Conscience and an Ancient Evil'' (1912) she dissected the social pathology of sex slavery, prostitution and other sexual behaviors among working-class women in American industrial centers from 1890 to 1910. Addams's autobiographical persona manifests her ideology and supports her popularized public activist persona as the "Mother of Social Work", in the sense that she represents herself as a celibate matron who served the suffering immigrant masses through Hull House, as if they were her own children. Although not a mother herself, Addams became the "mother to the nation", identified with motherhood in the sense of protective care of her people.
Teaching
Addams kept up her heavy schedule of public lectures around the country, especially at college campuses. In addition, she offered college courses through the Extension Division of the University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...
. She declined offers from the university to become directly affiliated with it, including an offer from Albion Small
Albion Woodbury Small (May 11, 1854 – March 24, 1926) founded the first independent department of sociology in the United States at the University of Chicago in Chicago, Illinois, in 1892. He was influential in the establishment of sociology a ...
, chair of the Department of Sociology, of a graduate faculty position. She declined in order to maintain her independent role outside of academia. Her goal was to teach adults not enrolled in formal academic institutions, because of their poverty and/or lack of credentials. Furthermore, she wanted no university controls over her political activism.
Addams was appointed to serve on the Chicago Board of Education. Addams was a charter member of the American Sociological Society, founded in 1905. She gave papers to it in 1912, 1915, and 1919. She was the most prominent woman member during her lifetime.
Relationships
Generally, Addams was close to a wide set of other women and was very good at eliciting their involvement from different classes in Hull House's programs. Nevertheless, throughout her life Addams did have romantic relationships with a few of these women, including Mary Rozet Smith and Ellen Starr
Ellen Gates Starr (March 19, 1859 – February 10, 1940) was an American Reform movement, social reformer and activist. With Jane Addams, she founded Chicago's Hull House, an adult education center, in 1889; the settlement house expanded t ...
. Her relationships offered her the time and energy to pursue her social work while being supported emotionally and romantically. From her exclusively romantic relationships with women, she would most likely be described as a lesbian
A lesbian is a homosexual woman or girl. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with female homosexu ...
in contemporary terms, similar to many leading figures in the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom of the time.
Her first romantic partner was Ellen Starr
Ellen Gates Starr (March 19, 1859 – February 10, 1940) was an American Reform movement, social reformer and activist. With Jane Addams, she founded Chicago's Hull House, an adult education center, in 1889; the settlement house expanded t ...
, with whom she founded Hull House, who she met when both were students at Rockford Female Seminary. In 1889, the two visited Toynbee Hall together and started their settlement house project, purchasing a house in Chicago.
Her second romantic partner was Mary Rozet Smith, who was wealthy and supported Addams's work at Hull House, and with whom she shared a house. Historian Lilian Faderman wrote that Jane was in love and she addressed Mary as "My Ever Dear", "Darling" and "Dearest One", and concluded that they shared the intimacy of a married couple. They remained together until 1934, when Mary died of pneumonia, after 40 years together.
It was said that, "Mary Smith became and always remained the highest and clearest note in the music that was Jane Addams' personal life". Together they owned a summer house in Bar Harbor, Maine
Bar Harbor () is a resort town on Mount Desert Island in Hancock County, Maine, United States. As of the 2020 census, its population is 5,089. The town is home to the College of the Atlantic, Jackson Laboratory, and MDI Biological Laborat ...
. When apart, they would write to each other at least once a day – sometimes twice. Addams would write to Smith, "I miss you dreadfully and am yours 'til death". The letters also show that the women saw themselves as a married couple: "There is reason in the habit of married folks keeping together", Addams wrote to Smith.
Religion and religious motives
Addams's religious beliefs were shaped by her wide reading and life experience. She saw her settlement work as part of the " social Christian" movement. Addams learned about social Christianity from the co-founders of Toynbee Hall, Samuel and Henrietta Barnett. The Barnetts held a great interest in converting others to Christianity, but they believed that Christians should be more engaged with the world and, in the words of one of the leaders of the social Christian movement in England, W. H. Fremantle, "imbue all human relations with the spirit of Christ's self-renouncing love".
According to Christie and Gauvreau (2001), while the Christian settlement houses sought to Christianize, Jane Addams "had come to epitomize the force of secular humanism." Her image was, however, "reinvented" by the Christian churches.
According to Joslin (2004), "The new humanism, as ddamsinterprets it comes from a secular, and not a religious, pattern of belief".
According to the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum, "Some social settlements were linked to religious institutions. Others, like Hull-House o-founded by Addams were secular."
Hilda Satt Polacheck, a former resident of Hull House, stated that Addams firmly believed in religious freedom and bringing people of all faiths into the social, secular fold of Hull House. The one exception, she notes, was the annual Christmas Party, although Addams left the religious side to the church.
The Bible served Addams as both a source of inspiration for her life of service and a manual for pursuing her calling. The emphasis on following Jesus' example and actively advancing the establishment of God's Kingdom on earth is also evident in Addams's work and the Social Gospel movement.
Politics
Peace movement
In 1898, Addams joined the Anti-Imperialist League, in opposition to the U.S. annexation of the Philippines
The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...
. A staunch supporter of the Progressive Party, she nominated Theodore Roosevelt for the presidency during the Party Convention, held in Chicago in August 1912. She signed up on the party platform, even though it called for building more battleship
A battleship is a large, heavily naval armour, armored warship with a main battery consisting of large naval gun, guns, designed to serve as a capital ship. From their advent in the late 1880s, battleships were among the largest and most form ...
s. She went on to speak and campaign extensively for Roosevelt's 1912 presidential campaign.
In January 1915, she became involved in the Woman's Peace Party
The Woman's Peace Party (WPP) was an American Pacifism, pacifist and First-wave feminism, feminist organization formally established in January 1915 in response to World War I. The organization is remembered as the first American peace organizatio ...
and was elected national chairman. Addams was invited by Europe
Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...
an women peace activists to preside over the International Congress of Women in The Hague, April 28–30, 1915, and was chosen to head the commission to find an end to the war. This included meeting ten leaders in neutral countries as well as those at war to discuss mediation. This was the first significant international effort against the war. Addams, along with co-delegates Emily Balch and Alice Hamilton, documented their experiences of this venture, published as a book, ''Women at The Hague'' (University of Illinois
The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC, U of I, Illinois, or University of Illinois) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Champaign–Urbana metropolitan area, Illinois, United ...
).
In her journal, Balch recorded her impression of Jane Addams (April 1915):
Miss Addams shines, so respectful of everyone's views, so eager to understand and sympathize, so patient of anarchy and even ego, yet always there, strong, wise and in the lead. No 'managing', no keeping dark and bringing things subtly to pass, just a radiating wisdom and power of judgement.
Addams was elected president of the International Committee of Women for a Permanent Peace, established to continue the work of the Hague Congress, at a conference in 1919 in Zürich
Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...
, Switzerland. The International Committee developed into the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF). Addams continued as president, a position that entailed frequent travel to Europe and Asia.
In 1917, she also became a member of the Fellowship of Reconciliation
The Fellowship of Reconciliation (FoR or FOR) is the name used by a number of religious nonviolent organizations, particularly in English-speaking countries. They are linked by affiliation to the International Fellowship of Reconciliation (IFOR). ...
USA (American branch of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation
The International Fellowship of Reconciliation (IFOR) is a non-governmental organization founded in 1914 in response to the horrors of war in Europe. Today IFOR counts 71 branches, groups and affiliates in 48 countries on all continents. IFOR m ...
founded in 1919) and was a member of the Fellowship Council until 1933. When the US joined the war in 1917, Addams started to be strongly criticized. She faced increasingly harsh rebukes and criticism as a pacifist. Her 1915 speech on pacifism at Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall ( ) is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is at 881 Seventh Avenue (Manhattan), Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between 56th Street (Manhattan), 56th and 57th Street (Manhattan), 57t ...
received negative coverage by newspapers such as ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', which branded her as unpatriotic. Later, during her travels, she spent time meeting with a wide variety of diplomats and civic leaders and reiterating her Victorian belief in women's special mission to preserve peace. Recognition of these efforts came with the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Addams in 1931. As the first U.S. woman to win the prize, Addams was applauded for her "expression of an essentially American democracy." She donated her share of the prize money to the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.
Pacifism
Addams was a major synthesizing figure in the domestic and international peace movements, serving as both a figurehead and leading theoretician; she was influenced especially by Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy
Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy Tolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; ,Throughout Tolstoy's whole life, his name was written as using Reforms of Russian orthography#The post-revolution re ...
and by the pragmatism of philosophers John Dewey
John Dewey (; October 20, 1859 – June 1, 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and Education reform, educational reformer. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century.
The overridi ...
and George Herbert Mead
George Herbert Mead (February 27, 1863 – April 26, 1931) was an American philosopher, Sociology, sociologist, and psychologist, primarily affiliated with the University of Chicago. He was one of the key figures in the development of pragmatis ...
. Her books, particularly ''Newer Ideals of Peace'' and ''Peace and Bread in Time of War'', and her peace activism informed early feminist theories and perspectives on peace and war. She envisioned democracy, social justice and peace as mutually reinforcing; they all had to advance together to achieve any one. Addams became an anti-war activist from 1899, as part of the anti-imperialist movement that followed the Spanish–American War
The Spanish–American War (April 21 – August 13, 1898) was fought between Restoration (Spain), Spain and the United States in 1898. It began with the sinking of the USS Maine (1889), USS ''Maine'' in Havana Harbor in Cuba, and resulted in the ...
. Her book ''Newer Ideals of Peace'' (1907) reshaped the peace movement worldwide to include ideals of social justice. She recruited social justice reformers like Alice Hamilton, Lillian Wald
Lillian D. Wald (March 10, 1867 – September 1, 1940) was an American nurse, humanitarian and author. She strove for human rights and started American community nursing. She founded the Henry Street Settlement in New York City and was an early ...
, Florence Kelley, and Emily Greene Balch to join her in the new international women's peace movement after 1914. Addams's work came to fruition after World War I
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
, when major institutional bodies began to link peace with social justice and probe the underlying causes of war and conflict.
In 1899 and 1907, world leaders sought peace by convening an innovative and influential peace conference at The Hague. These conferences produced Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907
The Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907 are a series of international treaties and declarations negotiated at two international peace conferences at The Hague in the Netherlands. Along with the Geneva Conventions, the Hague Conventions were amon ...
. A 1914 conference was canceled due to World War I
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
. The void was filled by an unofficial conference convened by Women at the Hague. At the time, both the US and The Netherlands were neutral. Jane Addams chaired this pathbreaking International Congress of Women at the Hague, which included almost 1,200 participants from 12 warring and neutral countries. Their goal was to develop a framework to end the violence of war. Both national and international political systems excluded women's voices. The women delegates argued that the exclusion of women from policy discourse and decisions around war and peace resulted in flawed policy. The delegates adopted a series of resolutions addressing these problems and called for extending the franchise and women's meaningful inclusion in formal international peace processes at war's end. Following the conference, Addams and a congressional delegation traveled throughout Europe meeting with leaders, citizen groups, and wounded soldiers from both sides. Her leadership during the conference and her travels to the capitals of the war-torn regions were cited in nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Addams was opposed to U.S. interventionism and expansionism
Expansionism refers to states obtaining greater territory through military Imperialism, empire-building or colonialism.
In the classical age of conquest moral justification for territorial expansion at the direct expense of another established p ...
and ultimately was against those who sought American dominance abroad. In 1915, she gave a speech at Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall ( ) is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is at 881 Seventh Avenue (Manhattan), Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between 56th Street (Manhattan), 56th and 57th Street (Manhattan), 57t ...
and was booed offstage for opposing U.S. intervention into World War I. Addams damned war as a cataclysm that undermined human kindness, solidarity, and civic friendship, and caused families across the world to struggle. In turn, her views were denounced by patriotic groups and newspapers during World War I (1917–18). Oswald Garrison Villard
Oswald Garrison Villard (March 13, 1872 – October 1, 1949) was an American journalist and editor of the ''New York Evening Post.'' He was a civil rights activist, and along with his mother, Fanny Villard, a founding member of the NAACP. In ...
came to her defense when she suggested that armies gave liquor to soldiers just before major ground attacks. "Take the case of Jane Addams for one. With what abuse did not the ew York''Times'' cover her, one of the noblest of our women, because she told the simple truth that the Allied troops were often given liquor or drugs before charging across No Man's Land. Yet when the facts came out at the hands of Sir Philip Gibbs and others not one word of apology was ever forthcoming." Even after the war, the WILPF's program of peace and disarmament was characterized by opponents as radical, Communist-influenced, unpatriotic, and unfeminine. Young veterans in the American Legion
The American Legion, commonly known as the Legion, is an Voluntary association, organization of United States, U.S. war veterans headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana. It comprises U.S. state, state, Territories of the United States, U.S. terr ...
, supported by some members of the Daughters of the American Revolution
The National Society Daughters of the American Revolution (often abbreviated as DAR or NSDAR) is a lineage-based membership service organization for women who are directly descended from a patriot of the American Revolutionary War.
A non-p ...
(DAR) and the League of Women Voters
The League of Women Voters (LWV) is a nonpartisan American nonprofit political organization. Founded in 1920, its ongoing major activities include Voter registration, registering voters, providing voter information, boosting voter turnout and adv ...
, were ill-prepared to confront the older, better-educated, more financially secure and nationally famous women of the WILPF. Nevertheless, the DAR could and did expel Addams from membership in their organization. The Legion's efforts to portray the WILPF members as dangerously naive females resonated with working class audiences, but President Calvin Coolidge
Calvin Coolidge (born John Calvin Coolidge Jr.; ; July 4, 1872January 5, 1933) was the 30th president of the United States, serving from 1923 to 1929. A Republican Party (United States), Republican lawyer from Massachusetts, he previously ...
and the middle classes supported Addams and her WILPF efforts in the 1920s to prohibit poison gas
Many gases have toxic properties, which are often assessed using the LC50 (median lethal concentration) measure. In the United States, many of these gases have been assigned an NFPA 704 health rating of 4 (may be fatal) or 3 (may cause serious ...
and outlaw war. After 1920, however, she was widely regarded as the greatest woman of the Progressive Era
The Progressive Era (1890s–1920s) was a period in the United States characterized by multiple social and political reform efforts. Reformers during this era, known as progressivism in the United States, Progressives, sought to address iss ...
. In 1931, the award of the Nobel Peace prize earned her near-unanimous acclaim.
Philosophy and "peaceweaving"
Jane Addams was also a philosopher of peace. Peace theorists often distinguish between negative and positive peace. Negative peace deals with the absence of violence or war. Positive peace is more complicated. It deals with the kind of society we aspire to, and can take into account concepts like justice, cooperation, the quality of relationships, freedom, order and harmony. Jane Addams's philosophy of peace is a type of positive peace. Patricia Shields and Joseph Soeters (2017) have summarized her ideas of peace using the term ''Peaceweaving''. They use weaving as a metaphor because it denotes connection. Fibers come together to form a cloth, which is both flexible and strong. Further, weaving is an activity in which men and women have historically engaged. Addams's ''peaceweaving'' is a process which builds "the fabric of peace by emphasizing relationships. Peaceweaving builds these relationships by working on practical problems, engaging people widely with sympathetic understanding while recognizing that progress is measured by the welfare of the vulnerable"
Eugenics
Addams supported eugenics and was vice president of the American Social Hygiene Association, which advocated eugenics in an effort to improve the social 'hygiene' of American society. She was a close friend of noted eugenicists David Starr Jordan
David Starr Jordan (January 19, 1851 – September 19, 1931) was the founding president of Stanford University, serving from 1891 to 1913. He was an ichthyologist during his research career. Prior to serving as president of Stanford Universi ...
and Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Charlotte Anna Perkins Gilman (; née Perkins; July 3, 1860 – August 17, 1935), also known by her first married name Charlotte Perkins Stetson, was an American humanist, novelist, writer, lecturer, early sociologist, advocate for social reform ...
, and was an avid proponent of the ideas of G. Stanley Hall
Granville Stanley Hall (February 1, 1844 – April 24, 1924) was an American psychologist and educator who earned the first doctorate in psychology awarded in the United States of America at Harvard University in the nineteenth century. His ...
. Addams belief in eugenics was tied to her desire to eliminate what she perceived to be ' social ills':
Prohibition
While "no record is available of any speech she ever made on behalf of the eighteenth amendment", she nonetheless supported prohibition on the basis that alcohol "was of course a leading lure and a necessary element in houses of prostitution, both from a financial and a social standpoint." She repeated the claim that "professional houses of prostitution could not sustain themselves without the 'vehicle of alcohol.'"
Death
While Addams was often troubled by health problems in her youth and throughout her life, her health began to take a more serious decline after she suffered a heart attack
A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when Ischemia, blood flow decreases or stops in one of the coronary arteries of the heart, causing infarction (tissue death) to the heart muscle. The most common symptom ...
in 1926.
She died on May 21, 1935, at the age of 74, in Chicago and is buried in her hometown of Cedarville, Illinois.
Adult life and legacy
Jane Addams is buried at Cedarville Cemetery, Cedarville, Illinois.
Hull House and the Peace Movement are widely recognized as the key tangible pillars of Addams's legacy. While her life focused on the development of individuals, her ideas continue to influence social, political and economic reform in the United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
, as well as internationally. Addams and Starr's creation of the settlement house, Hull House, impacted the community, immigrant residents, and social work.
Willard Motley, a resident artist of Hull House, extracting from Addams' central theory on symbolic interactionism, used the neighborhood and its people to write his 1948 best seller, '' Knock on Any Door''. His novel later became a well known court-room film in 1949. This book and film brought attention to how a resident lived an everyday life inside a settlement house and his relationship with Jane Addams.
Addams's role as reformer enabled her to petition the establishment at and alter the social and physical geography of her Chicago neighborhood. Although contemporary academic sociologists defined her engagement as "social work", Addams's efforts differed significantly from activities typically labeled as "social work" during that time period. Before Addams's powerful influence on the profession, social work was largely informed by a "friendly visitor" model in which typically wealthy women of high public stature visited impoverished individuals and, through systematic assessment and intervention, aimed to improve the lives of the poor. Addams rejected the friendly visitor model in favor of a model of social reform/social theory-building, thereby introducing the now-central tenets of social justice and reform to the field of social work.
Addams worked with other reform groups toward goals including the first juvenile court
Juvenile court, also known as young offender's court or children's court, is a tribunal having special authority to pass judgements for crimes committed by children who have not attained the age of majority. In most modern legal systems, chi ...
law, tenement-house regulation, an eight-hour working day for women, factory inspection, and workers' compensation. She advocated research aimed at determining the causes of poverty and crime, and she supported women's suffrage. She was a strong advocate of justice for immigrants, African Americans, and minority groups by becoming a chartered member of the NAACP
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is an American civil rights organization formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E. B. Du&nbs ...
. Among the projects that the members of Hull House opened were the Immigrants' Protective League, the Juvenile Protective Association, the first juvenile court in the United States, and a juvenile psychopathic clinic.
Addams's influential writings and speeches, on behalf of the formation of the League of Nations
The League of Nations (LN or LoN; , SdN) was the first worldwide intergovernmental organisation whose principal mission was to maintain world peace. It was founded on 10 January 1920 by the Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920), Paris Peace ...
and as a peace advocate, influenced the later shape of the United Nations
The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...
.
Jane Addams also sponsored the work of Neva Boyd, who founded the Recreational Training School at Hull House, a one-year educational program in group games, gymnastics, dancing, dramatic arts, play theory, and social problems. At Hull House, Neva Boyd ran movement and recreational groups for children, using games and improvisation to teach language skills, problem-solving, self-confidence and social skills. During the Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
, Boyd worked with the Recreational Project in the Works Progress Administration
The Works Progress Administration (WPA; from 1935 to 1939, then known as the Work Projects Administration from 1939 to 1943) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to car ...
, (WPA) as The Chicago Training School for Playground Workers, which subsequently became the foundation for the Recreational Therapy and Educational Drama movements in the U.S. One of her best known disciples, Viola Spolin taught in the Recreational Theater Program at Hull House during the WPA era. Spolin went on to be a pioneer in the improvisational theater movement in the US and the inventor of Theater Games.
The main legacy left by Jane Addams includes her involvement in the creation of the Hull House, impacting communities and the whole social structure, reaching out to colleges and universities in hopes of bettering the educational system, and passing on her knowledge to others through speeches and books. She paved the way for women by publishing several books and co-winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 1931 with Starr.
The Jane Addams Papers Project, originally housed at the University of Illinois at Chicago and Duke University, was relocated to Ramapo College in 2015. The project's digital edition actively engages students and the world with the work and correspondence of Jane Addams.
The Addams Addams is a patronymic surname of English origin from the given name Adam. There are other spellings. Notable people with the surname include:
* Calpernia Addams (born 1971), American transgender author, actress, and activist
* Christian Hejnal Ad ...
neighborhood and elementary school in Long Beach, California
Long Beach is a coastal city in southeastern Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is the list of United States cities by population, 44th-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 451,307 as of 2022. A charter ci ...
are named for her.
Sociology
Jane Addams was intimately involved with the founding of sociology as a field in the United States.[Deegan, M. J. (1988). ''Jane Addams and the Men of the Chicago School, 1892–1918.'' New Brunswick, NJ, USA: Transaction Books. ] Hull House enabled Addams to befriend and become a colleague to early members of the Chicago School of Sociology. She actively contributed to the sociology academic literature, publishing five articles in the ''American Journal of Sociology
The ''American Journal of Sociology'' is a peer-reviewed bi-monthly academic journal that publishes original research and book reviews in the field of sociology and related social sciences. It was founded in 1895 as the first journal in its disci ...
'' between 1896 and 1914. Her influence, through her work in applied sociology, impacted the thought and direction of the Chicago School of Sociology's members. In 1893, she co-authored the compilation of essays written by Hull House residents and workers titled, ''Hull-House Maps and Papers''. These ideas helped shape and define the interests and methodologies of the Chicago School. She worked with American philosopher George Herbert Mead
George Herbert Mead (February 27, 1863 – April 26, 1931) was an American philosopher, Sociology, sociologist, and psychologist, primarily affiliated with the University of Chicago. He was one of the key figures in the development of pragmatis ...
and John Dewey on social reform issues, including promoting women's rights, ending child labor, and mediating during the 1910 Garment Workers' Strike. This strike in particular bent thoughts of protests because it dealt with women workers, ethnicity, and working conditions. All of these subjects were key items that Addams wanted to see in society.
The University of Chicago Sociology department was established in 1892, three years after Hull House was established (1889). Members of Hull House welcomed the first group of professors, who soon were "intimately involved with Hull House" and assiduously engaged with applied social reform and philanthropy". In 1893, for example, faculty (Vincent, Small and Bennis) worked with Jane Addams and fellow Hull House resident Florence Kelley to pass legislation "banning sweat shops and employment of children" Albion Small
Albion Woodbury Small (May 11, 1854 – March 24, 1926) founded the first independent department of sociology in the United States at the University of Chicago in Chicago, Illinois, in 1892. He was influential in the establishment of sociology a ...
, chair of the Chicago Department of Sociology and founder of the ''American Journal of Sociology'', called for a sociology that was active "in the work of perfecting and applying plans and devices for social improvement and amelioration", which took place in the "vast sociological laboratory" that was 19th-century Chicago. Although untenured, women residents of Hull House taught classes in the Chicago Sociology Department. During and after World War I, the focus of the Chicago Sociology Department shifted away from social activism toward a more scholarly orientation. Social activism was also associated with Communism and a "weaker" woman's work orientation. In response to this change, women sociologists in the department "were moved inmasse out of sociology and into social work" in 1920. The contributions of Jane Addams and other Hull House residents were buried in history.
Mary Jo Deegan, in her 1988 book ''Jane Addams and the Men of the Chicago School, 1892–1918'' was the first person to recover Addams' influence on sociology. Deegan's work has led to recognition of Addams's place in sociology. In a 2001 address, for example, Joe Feagin, then president of the American Sociology Association, identified Addams as a "key founder" and he called for sociology to again claim its activist roots and commitment to social justice.
Remembrances
On December 10, 2007, Illinois celebrated the first annual Jane Addams Day. Jane Addams Day was initiated by a dedicated school teacher from Dongola, Illinois, assisted by the Illinois Division of the American Association of University Women
The American Association of University Women (AAUW), officially founded in 1881, is a non-profit organization that advances Justice, equity for women and girls through advocacy, education, and research. The organization has a nationwide Social net ...
(AAUW). Chicago activist Jan Lisa Huttner traveled throughout Illinois as Director of International Relations for AAUW-Illinois to help publicize the date, and later gave annual presentations about Jane Addams Day in costume as Jane Addams. In 2010, Huttner appeared as Jane Addams at a 150th Birthday Party sponsored by Rockford University
Rockford University is a private university in Rockford, Illinois, United States. It was founded in 1847 as Rockford Female Seminary and changed its name to Rockford College in 1892, and to Rockford University in 2013.
History
Beginning
Roc ...
(Jane Addams' alma mater), and in 2011, she appeared as Jane Addams at an event sponsored by the Chicago Park District
The Chicago Park District is one of the oldest and the largest park districts in the United States. As of 2016, there are over 600 parks included in the Chicago Park District as well as 27 beaches, 10 boat docking harbors, two botanic conservat ...
.
There is a Jane Addams Memorial Park located near Navy Pier
Navy Pier is a pier on the shoreline of Lake Michigan, located in the Streeterville neighborhood of the Near North Side, Chicago, Near North Side community area in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Navy Pier encompasses over of shops, restaura ...
in Chicago. A six-piece sculptural grouping honoring Addams by Louise Bourgeois called "Helping Hands" was originally installed in 1993 at Addams Memorial Park. However, they were "relocated to Chicago Women's Park and Gardens" in 2011 after being vandalized. The Jane Addams memorial sculpture was Chicago's first major artwork to honor an important woman. In 2007, the state of Illinois renamed the Northwest Tollway as the Jane Addams Memorial Tollway
Interstate 90 (I-90) in the US state of Illinois runs roughly northwest-to-southeast through the northern part of the state. From the Wisconsin state line at South Beloit, it heads south to Rockford before heading east-southeast to th ...
. Hull House buildings were mostly demolished for the establishment of the campus of the University of Illinois at Chicago
The University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) is a public research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its campus is in the Near West Side community area, adjacent to the Chicago Loop. The second campus established under the Universi ...
in 1963, or relocated. The Hull residence itself and a related building are preserved as a museum and monument to Jane Addams.
The Jane Addams College of Social Work is a professional school at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Jane Addams Business Careers Center is a high school in Cleveland, Ohio
Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–United States border, Canada–U.S. maritime border ...
. Jane Addams High School For Academic Careers is a high school in The Bronx, NY. Jane Addams House is a residence hall built in 1936 at Connecticut College
Connecticut College (Conn) is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in New London, Connecticut. Originally chartered as Thames College, it was founded in 1911 as the state's only women's colle ...
.
In 1973, Jane Addams was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame
The National Women's Hall of Fame (NWHF) is an American institution founded to honor and recognize women. It was incorporated in 1969 in Seneca Falls, New York, and first inducted honorees in 1973. As of 2024, the Hall has honored 312 inducte ...
. In 2008 Jane Addams was inducted into the Chicago Gay and Lesbian Hall of Fame. Addams was inducted into the Chicago Literary Hall of Fame in 2012. Also, in 2012 she was inducted into the Legacy Walk, an outdoor public display which celebrates LGBTQ
LGBTQ people are individuals who are lesbian, Gay men, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning (sexuality and gender), questioning. Many variants of the initialism are used; LGBTQIA+ people incorporates intersex, Asexuality, asexual, ...
history and people. In 2014, Jane Addams was one of the first 20 honorees awarded a 3-foot x 3-foot bronze plaque on San Francisco's Rainbow Honor Walk (www.rainbowhonorwalk.org) paying tribute to LGBT heroes and heroines. In 2015, Addams was named by Equality Forum as one of their 31 Icons of the 2015 LGBT History Month.
Works by Jane Addams
Books
''Democracy and Social Ethics''
New York, The Macmillan Company, 1902.
''Newer Ideals of Peace''
New York, The Macmillan Company, 1907.
''The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets''
New York, The Macmillan Company, 1909.
''Twenty Years at Hull House. With autobiographical notes''
New York, The New American Library, 1910.
''Symposium: child labor on the stage''
National Child Labor Committee, New York 911?
''A New Conscience And An Ancient Evil,''
New York, The Macmillan company, 1912.
''The Long Road of Woman's Memory''
New York, The Macmillan Company, 1916.
''Peace and Bread in Time of War''
New York, The Macmillan Company, 1922.
''The Second Twenty Years at Hull House''
New York, The Macmillan Company, 1930.
''The Excellent Becomes the Permanent''
New York, The Macmillan Company, 1932.
''My Friend Julia Lathrop''
New York, The Macmillan Company, 1935. (ed. 2004, Urbana, University of Illinois Press)
Collaborative Works
*''Women at The Hague: The International Congress of Women'', with Alice Hamilton and Emily Greene Balch, Macmillan Company 191
Personal Papers
''Jane Addams Digital Edition''
Jane Addams Papers Project, Ramapo College of New Jersey.
See also
* Jane Addams Burial Site
* Jane Addams School for Democracy
* Jane Addams Middle School
* Jane Addams Children's Book Award
* John H. Addams Homestead
* List of American philosophers
American philosophy is the activity, corpus, and tradition of philosophers affiliated with the United States. The ''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' notes that while it lacks a "core of defining features, American Philosophy can neverthe ...
* List of female Nobel laureates
The Nobel Prizes are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel#Nobel Prize, Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to Mankind." Additionally, the Nobel Mem ...
* List of peace activists
This list of peace activists includes people who have proactively advocated Diplomacy, diplomatic, philosophical, and non-military resolution of major territorial or ideological disputes through nonviolent means and methods. Peace activists usua ...
* List of suffragists and suffragettes
This list of suffragists and suffragettes includes noted individuals active in the worldwide women's suffrage movement who have campaigned or strongly advocated for women's suffrage, the organisations which they formed or joined, and the publi ...
* List of women's rights activists
Notable women's rights activists are as follows, arranged alphabetically by modern country names and by the names of the persons listed:
Afghanistan
* Amina Azimi – disabled women's rights advocate
* Hasina Jalal – women's empowerment activis ...
* John Dewey
John Dewey (; October 20, 1859 – June 1, 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and Education reform, educational reformer. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century.
The overridi ...
* Florence Kelley
Florence Molthrop Kelley (September 12, 1859 – February 17, 1932) was an American social and political reformer who coined the term wage abolitionism. Her work against sweatshops and for the minimum wage, eight-hour workdays, and children's ...
* Flora Dunlap
* Mary Treglia
* Elizabeth Harrison (educator)
Elizabeth Harrison (September 1, 1849 – October 31, 1927) was an American educator from Kentucky. She was the founder and first president of what is today National Louis University in Chicago, Illinois. Harrison was a pioneer in creating profes ...
* Community practice social work
* Stanton Street Settlement
* Progressive Party (United States, 1912)
The Progressive Party, popularly nicknamed the Bull Moose Party, was a third party in the United States formed in 1912 by former president Theodore Roosevelt after he lost the presidential nomination of the Republican Party to his former prot ...
* American philosophy
American philosophy is the activity, corpus, and tradition of philosophers affiliated with the United States. The ''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' notes that while it lacks a "core of defining features, American Philosophy can neverthe ...
* International Fellowship of Reconciliation
The International Fellowship of Reconciliation (IFOR) is a non-governmental organization founded in 1914 in response to the horrors of war in Europe. Today IFOR counts 71 branches, groups and affiliates in 48 countries on all continents. IFOR m ...
* Addams (crater)
References
Further reading
*
Archival resources
Jane Addams Collection, 1838-date (bulk 1880–1935)
() is housed at Swarthmore College
Swarthmore College ( , ) is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1864, with its first classes held in 1869, Swarthmore is one of the e ...
Peace Collection.
Jane Addams Papers, 1904–1960 (bulk 1904–1936)
() is housed at Smith College
Smith College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts Women's colleges in the United States, women's college in Northampton, Massachusetts, United States. It was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smit ...
Sophia Smith Collection
The Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College is an internationally recognized repository of manuscripts, photographs, periodicals and other primary sources in women's history.
General
One of the largest recognized repositories of manuscripts, a ...
. In 2015, The Jane Addams Papers Project relaunched at Ramapo College led by Cathy Moran Hajo, and others https://janeaddams.ramapo.edu
*For more information on the history and current archival efforts see Moran Hajo, Cathy, (2023) 'Making the Jane Addams Papers Accessible to New Audiences', in Patricia M. Shields, Maurice Hamington, and Joseph Soeters (eds), ''The Oxford Handbook of Jane Addams'' Oxford Academic, .
* Jane Addams Correspondence, 1872–1935 (inclusive) (23 reels) is housed at Harvard University
Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study.
Biographies
*
*
* Davis, Allen F. ''American Heroine: The Life and Legend of Jane Addams'' (1973), 339pp, solid scholarship but tends toward debunking
* Diliberto, Gioia. ''A Useful Woman: The Early Life of Jane Addams.'' (1999). 318 pp.
* Elshtain, Jean Bethke. ''Jane Addams and the Dream of American Democracy: A Life'' Basic Books: 200
online edition
, by a leading conservative scholar
* Haldeman-Julius, Marcet. ''Jane Addams As I Knew Her''. Girard, Kansas: Haldeman-Julius Publications, ca. 1936. Marcet was Addams's niece.
* Knight, Louise W. ''Citizen: Jane Addams and the Struggle for Democracy.'' (2005). 582 pp.; biography to 189
online edition
* Knight, Louise W. ''Jane Addams: Spirit in Action.'' (2010). 334 pp., complete biography aimed at a broader audience.
* Joslin, Katherine. ''Jane Addams: A Writer's Life.'' (2004). 306 pp.
* Linn, James W. ''Jane Addams: A Biography.'' (1935) 457 pp, by her admiring nephew
Specialty studies
* Agnew, Elizabeth N. "A Will to Peace: Jane Addams, World War I, and 'Pacifism in Practice'" ''Peace & Change'' (2017) 42#1 pp 5–31 ,
* Alonso, Harriet Hyman. "Nobel Peace Laureates, Jane Addams And Emily Greene Balch: Two Women of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom". ''Journal of Women's History'' 1995 7(2): 6–26.
* Beauboeuf-Lafontant, Tamara. "Becoming Jane Addams: Feminist Developmental Theory and' The College Woman'" ''Girlhood Studies'' (2014) 7#2 pp: 61–78.
* Beer, Janet and Joslin, Katherine. "Diseases of the Body Politic: White Slavery in Jane Addams' "A New Conscience and an Ancient Evil" and "Selected Short Stories" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman". ''Journal of American Studies'' 1999 33(1): 1–18.
* Bowen, Louise de Koven. ''Growing up with Pity''. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1926.
* Brinkmann, Tobias. ''Sundays at Sinai: A Jewish Congregation in Chicago'' (2012), on Addams relationship with Chicago Jews.
* Bryan, Mary Linn McCree, and Allen F. Davis. ''One Hundred Years at Hull-House'' (1990), a history of the programs there
* Burnier, D. (2022) The long road of administrative memory: Jane Addams, Frances Perkins, and care-centered administration. In Shields, P. and Elias, N. eds. ''The Handbook of Gender and Public Administration''. pp. 53–67. Edward Elgar. https://www.elgaronline.com/display/edcoll/9781789904727/9781789904727.00012.xml
* Craraft, James. ''Two Shining Souls: Jane Addams, Leo Tolstoy, and the Quest for Global Peace'' (Lanham: Lexington, 2012).179 pp.
* Carson, Minal. ''Settlement Folk: Social Thought and the American Settlement Movement, 1885–1930'' (1990)
* Chansky, Dorothy. "Re-visioning Reform", ''American Quarterly'' vol 55 #3 (2003) 515–523 online at Project MUSE
* Curti, Merle. "Jane Addams on Human Nature", ''Journal of the History of Ideas'' Vol. 22, No. 2 (Apr. 1961), pp. 240–25
in JSTOR
* Danielson, Caroline Page. "Citizen Acts: Citizenship and Political Agency in the Works of Jane Addams, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and Emma Goldman". PhD dissertation U. of Michigan 1996. 331 pp. DAI 1996 57(6): 2651-A. DA9635502 Fulltext: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses
* Dawley, Alan. ''Changing the World: American Progressives in War and Revolution'' (2003)
* Deegan, Mary Jo. "Jane Addams, the Hull-House School of Sociology, and Social Justice, 1892 to 1935". '' Humanity & Society'' (2013) 37#3 pp: 248–258.
* Deegan, Mary Jo. ''Jane Addams and the Men of the Chicago School, 1892–1918''. (Transaction, Inc., 1988).
* Donovan, Brian. ''White Slave Crusades: Race, Gender, and Anti-Vice Activism, 1887–1917.'' (U of Illinois Press. 2006). 186 pp.
* Duffy, William. "Remembering is the Remedy: Jane Addams's Response to Conflicted Discourse". ''Rhetoric Review'' (2011) 30#2 pp: 135–152.
* Fischer, Marilyn; Nackenoff, Carol; Chmielewski, Wendy eds. ''Jane Addams and the Practice of Democracy'' (2009), 230 pp; 11 specialized essays by scholars.
* Foust, Mathew A. "Perplexities of Filiality: Confucius and Jane Addams on the Private/Public Distinction", ''Asian Philosophy'' (2008) 18(2): 149–166.
* Grimm, Robert Thornton Jr. "Forerunners for a Domestic Revolution: Jane Addams, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and the Ideology Of Childhood, 1900–1916". ''Illinois Historical Journal'' 1997 90(1): 47–64.
* Gustafson, Melanie. ''Women and the Republican Party, 1854–1924'' (University of Illinois Press, 2001).
* Hamington, Maurice. "Jane Addams", ''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' (2007
online edition
Addams as philosopher
* Hamington, Maurice. ''Embodied Care Jane Addams, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and Feminist Ethics'' (2004
excerpt and online search at amazon.com
* Hamington, Maurice. "Jane Addams and a Politics of Embodied Care", ''The Journal of Speculative Philosophy'' v 15 #2 2001, pp. 105–121 online at Project MUSE
* Hamington, Maurice. "Public Pragmatism: Jane Addams and Ida B. Wells on Lynching", ''The Journal of Speculative Philosophy'' v. 19#2 (2005), pp. 167–174 online at Project MUSE
* Hansen, Jonathan M. "Fighting Words: The Transnational Patriotism of Eugene V. Debs, Jane Addams, and W. E. B. Du Bois". PhD dissertation Boston U. 1997. 286 pp. DAI 1997 57(10): 4511-A. DA9710148 Fulltext: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses
* Henderson, Karla A. "Jane Addams: Leisure Services Pioneer". ''Journal of Physical Education, Recreation & Dance'', (1982) 53#2 pp. 42–45
* Imai, Konomi, and 今井小の実. "The Women's Movement and the Settlement Movement in Early Twentieth-Century Japan: The Impact of Hull House and Jane Addams on Hiratsuka Raichō". ''Kwansei Gakuin University humanities review'' 17 (2013): 85–109
online
* Jackson, Shannon. ''Lines of Activity: Performance, Historiography, Hull-House Domesticity'' (2000). 384 pp.
* Joslin, Katherine. ''Jane Addams: A writer's Life'' (2009
excerpt and text search
* Krysiak, Barbara H. "Full-Service Community Schools: Jane Addams Meets John Dewey". ''School Business Affairs'', v67 n8 pp. Aug 4–8, 2001.
* Knight, Louise W. "An Authoritative Voice: Jane Addams and the Oratorical Tradition". ''Gender & History'' 1998 10(2): 217–251. Fulltext: Ebsco
* Knight, Louise W. "Biography's Window on Social Change: Benevolence and Justice in Jane Addams's 'A Modern Lear.'" ''Journal of Women's History'' 1997 9(1): 111–138. Fulltext: Ebsco
* Knight, Louise W., (2023)'A Biographer's Angle on Jane Addams's Feminism', in P. Shields, M. Hamington, and J. Soeters (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Jane Addams. pp. 279–304. Oxford Academic, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780197544518.013.2
* Lissak, R. S. ''Pluralism and Progressives: Hull-House and the New Immigrants.'' (1989)
* Matassarin, Kat. "Jane Addams of Hull-House: Creative Drama at the Turn of the Century". ''Children's Theatre Review'', Oct 1983. v32 n4 pp 13–15
* Morton, Keith. "Addams, Day, and Dewey: The Emergence of Community Service in American Culture". ''Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning'', Fall 1997 v4 pp 137–49 * Oakes, Jeannie. ''Becoming Good American Schools: The Struggle for Civic Virtue in Education Reform.'' (2000).
* Ostman, Heather Elaine. "Social Activist Visions: Constructions of Womanhood in the Autobiographies of Jane Addams and Emma Goldman". PhD dissertation Fordham U. 2004. 240 pp. DAI 2004 65(3): 934-A. DA3125022 Fulltext: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses
* Packard, Sandra. "Jane Addams: Contributions and Solutions for Art Education". ''Art Education'', 29, 1, 9–12, Jan 76.
* Phillips, J. O. C. "The Education of Jane Addams". ''History of Education Quarterly'', 14, 1, 49–68, Spr 74.
* Philpott, Thomas. L. ''The Slum and the Ghetto: Immigrants, Blacks, and Reformers in Chicago, 1880–1930.'' (1991).
* Platt, Harold. "Jane Addams and the Ward Boss Revisited: Class, Politics, and Public Health in Chicago, 1890–1930". ''Environmental History'' 2000 5(2): 194–222.
* Polacheck, Hilda Satt. ''I Came a Stranger: The Story of a Hull-House Girl''. Chicago, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1989.
* Sargent, David Kevin. "Jane Addams's Rhetorical Ethic". PhD dissertation Northwestern U. 1996. 275 pp. DAI 1997 57(11): 4597-A. DA9714673 Fulltext: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses
* Scherman, Rosemarie Redlich. "Jane Addams and the Chicago Social Justice Movement, 1889–1912". PhD dissertation City U. of New York 1999. 337 pp. DAI 1999 60(4): 1297-A. DA9924849 Fulltext: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses
* Schott, Linda. "Jane Addams and William James on Alternatives to War". ''Journal of the History of Ideas'' 1993 54(2): 241–254
in JSTOR
* Seigfried, Charlene H. "A Pragmatist Response to Death: Jane Addams on the Permanent and the Transient". ''Journal of Speculative Philosophy'' (2007) 21(2): 133–141.
* Shields, Patricia M. 2006. "Democracy and the Social Feminist Ethics of Jane Addams: A Vision for Public Administration". ''Administrative Theory & Praxis'', vol. 28, no. 3, September, pp. 418–443
Democracy and the Social Feminist Ethics of Jane Addams: A Vision for Public Administration
* Shields, Patricia M. 2011. "Jane Addams' Theory of Democracy and Social Ethics: Incorporating a Feminist Perspective". In ''Women in Public Administration: Theory and Practice.'' Edited by Maria D'Agostiono and Helisse Levine, Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlet.
* Shields, Patricia M. 2017. "Jane Addams: Progressive Pioneer of Peace, Philosophy, Sociology, Social Work and Public Administration". New York: Springer.
* Shields, Patricia M. and Soeters, Joseph. 2017. Peaceweaving: Jane Addams, Positive Peace and Public Administration. The ''American Review of Public Administration'' Vol. 47, no 3 pp. 323–399. doi/10.1177/0275074015589629.
* Shields, Patricia M., Maurice Hamington, and Joseph Soeters (eds). (2023) ''The Oxford Handbook of Jane Addams'' Oxford academic. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780197544518.001.0001
* Sklar, Kathryn Kish. "Hull House in the 1890s: A Community of Women Reformers", ''Signs,'' Vol. 10, No. 4, (Summer, 1985), pp. 658–67
in JSTOR
* Sklar, Kathryn Kish. "'Some of us who deal with the Social Fabric': Jane Addams Blends Peace and Social Justice, 1907–1919". ''Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era'' 2003 2(1): 80–96.
* Soeters, Joseph. 2018. "Jane Addams: From Peace Activism to Pragmatic Peacekeeper" Chapter 5 in ''Sociology and Military Studies: Classical and Current Foundations'' New York: Routledge
* Stebner, E. J. ''The Women of Hull-House: A Study in Spirituality, Vocation, and Friendship.'' (1997).
* Stiehm, Judith Hicks. ''Champions for Peace: Women Winners of the Nobel Peace Prize.'' Rowman and Littlefield, 2006.
* Sullivan, M. "Social work's legacy of peace: Echoes from the early 20th century". ''Social Work'', Sep. 93; 38(5): 513–520
EBSCO
* Toft, Jessica and Abrams, Laura S. "Progressive Maternalists and the Citizenship Status of Low-Income Single Mothers". ''Social Service Review'' 2004 78(3): 447–465. Fulltext: Ebsco
Primary sources
* Addams, Jane. "A Belated Industry" ''The American Journal of Sociology'' Vol. 1, No. 5 (Mar. 1896), pp. 536–55
in JSTOR
* Addams, Jane. ''The subjective value of a social settlement'' (1892
online
* Addams, Jane, ed. ''Hull-House Maps and Papers: A Presentation of Nationalities and Wages in a Congested District of Chicago, Together with Comments and Essays on Problems Growing Out of the Social Conditions'' (1896; reprint 2007
excerpts and online search from amazon.comfull text
* Kelley, Florence. "Hull House" ''The New England Magazine.'' Volume 24, Issue 5. (July 1898) pp. 550–56
online at MOA
* Addams, Jane. "Ethical Survivals in Municipal Corruption", ''International Journal of Ethics'' Vol. 8, No. 3 (Apr. 1898), pp. 273–29
in JSTOR
* Addams, Jane. "Trades Unions and Public Duty", ''The American Journal of Sociology'' Vol. 4, No. 4 (Jan. 1899), pp. 448–46
in JSTOR
* Addams, Jane. "The Subtle Problems of Charity", ''The Atlantic Monthly.'' Volume 83, Issue 496 (February 1899) pp. 163–17
online at MOA
* Addams, Jane. ''Democracy and Social Ethics'' (1902
online at Internet Archiveonline at Harvard Library
** 23 editions published between 1902 and 2006 in English and held by 1,570 libraries worldwide
* Addams, Jane. ''Child labor'' 190
Harvard Library online
* Addams, Jane. "Problems of Municipal Administration", ''The American Journal of Sociology'' Vol. 10, No. 4 (Jan. 1905), pp. 425–44
JSTOR
* Addams, Jane. "Child Labor Legislation – A Requisite for Industrial Efficiency", ''Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science'' Vol. 25, Child Labor (May 1905), pp. 128–13
in JSTOR
* Addams, Jane. ''The operation of the Illinois child labor law,'' (1906
online at Harvard Library
* Addams, Jane. ''Newer Ideals of Peace'' (1906
online at Internet Archive
** 13 editions published between 1906 and 2007 in English and held by 686 libraries worldwide
* Addams, Jane. ''National protection for children'' 190
online at Harvard Library
* Addams, Jane. ''The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets'' (1909
online at books.google.com
online at Harvard Library
** 16 editions published between 1909 and 1972 in English and held by 1,094 libraries worldwide
* Addams, Jane. ''Twenty Years at Hull-House: With Autobiographical Notes,'' 191
online at Harvard Library
** 72 editions published between 1910 and 2007 in English and held by 3,250 libraries worldwide
* Addams, Jane. ''A new conscience and an ancient evil'' (1912
online at Harvard Library
** 14 editions published between 1912 and 2003 in English and held by 912 libraries worldwide
* Addams, Jane; Balch, Emily Greene; and Hamilton, Alice. ''Women at the Hague: The International Congress of Women and Its Results.'' (1915) reprint ed by Harriet Hyman Alonso, (2003). 91 pp
online at Harvard Library
* Addams, Jane. ''The Long Road of Woman's Memory'' (1916
online at Internet Archiveonline at Harvard Library
also reprint U. of Illinois Press, 2002. 84 pp.
* Addams, Jane. ''Peace and Bread in Time of War'' 192
online edition
online at Harvard Library
** 12 editions published between 1922 and 2002 in English and held by 835 libraries worldwide
* Addams, Jane. ''My Friend, Julia Lathrop.'' (1935; reprint U. of Illinois Press, 2004) 166 pp.
* Addams, Jane. ''Jane Addams: A Centennial Reader'' (1960
online edition
* Bryan, Mary Lynn McCree, Barbara Bair, and Maree De Angury. eds., ''The Selected Papers of Jane Addams Volume 1: Preparing to Lead, 1860–1881.'' University of Illinois Press, 2002
online excerpt and text search
* Elshtain, Jean B. ed. ''The Jane Addams Reader'' (2002), 488pp
* Lasch, Christopher, ed. (1965). ''The Social Thought of Jane Addams''.
External links
Digital collections
*
*
*
*
* Harvard University Library Open Collections Program. Women Working, 1870–1930
A full-text searchable online database with complete access to publications written by Jane Addams.
Jane Addams Digital Edition, Ramapo College of New Jersey
*
Jane Addams
bibliographical and biographical references. - Center for the History of Women Philosophers and Scientists
Physical collections
Online photograph exhibit of Jane Addams from Swarthmore College's Peace Collection
Guide to the Jane Addams Collection 1894–1919
at th
University of Chicago Special Collections Research Center
Jane Addams Papers
at the Sophia Smith Collection
The Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College is an internationally recognized repository of manuscripts, photographs, periodicals and other primary sources in women's history.
General
One of the largest recognized repositories of manuscripts, a ...
, Smith College
Ellen Gates Starr Papers
at the Sophia Smith Collection, Smith College
*
Biographical information
FBI file on Jane Addams
Jane Addams on the history of social work timeline
Jane Addams
National Women's Hall of Fame
Kathi Coon Badertscher: "Jane Addams", In: ''1914–1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War''
*
Hull House links
Jane Addams Hull-House Museum
Jane Addams's Hull-House
Taylor Street Archives; Hull House: Bowen Country Club
Scholarship and analysis
* Michals, Debr
"Jane Addams"
National Women's History Museum. 2017.
* Sklar, Kathryn Kish et al. "How Did Changes in the Built Environment at Hull-House Reflect the Settlement's Interaction with Its Neighbors, 1889–1912?" Sklar, Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600–2000
* Looks at her as "the first woman 'public philosopher' in United States history".
American Commission for Peace in Ireland Interim Report
Other links
*
The Bitter Cry of Outcast London
by Rev. Andrew Mearns
International Fellowship of Reconciliation
Short historical film showing Jane Addams in Berlin in 1915
on her peace mission with Aletta Jacobs and Alice Hamilton.
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Addams, Jane
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