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Mary Eliza Mahoney
First Registered
Black Nurse
Mary Eliza Mahoney
(1845-1926) -- born free on May 7, 1845 in Dorchester,
Massachusetts -- was the first African-American registered
nurse in the U.S.A. She lived with her parents, Charles
Mahoney and Mary Jane Steward Mahoney, at 31 Westminster Street
in Roxbury. For
fifteen years Mary Eliza worked alternately as a a cook, janitor, washerwoman
and an unofficial nurse's assistant at the New England Hospital for Women and
Children (now Dimock Community Health Center) in
Roxbury, Massachusetts.
In 1878, at the age
of thirty-three, she was admitted as a student into the
hospital's nursing program established by Dr. Marie
Zakrzewska.
After graduation sixteen months
later, Mary Eliza worked primarily as a private duty
nurse. Her nursing career ended as director of
an orphanage in Long Island, New York, a position she had held
for a decade. She never married.
In 1896, Mahoney became one of the original
members of a predominately white Nurses Associated Alumnae of
the United States and Canada (later known as the American Nurses
Association or ANA). Mahoney recognized the need for nurses to work together to
improve the status of blacks in the profession. In 1908 she was cofounder of the National
Association of Colored Graduate Nurses (NACGN). Mahoney gave the
welcoming address at the first convention of the NACGN and
served as the association's national chaplain.
She became an
inspiration to The National Association of Colored Graduate
Nurses and helped make it possible for the nurses to be received
at the White House by President Warren G. Harding. Mary Eliza
Mahoney died January 4, 1926. She is buried in the Woodlawn
Cemetery in Everett, Massachusetts.
Because of
her dedication and untiring will to inspire future generations,
Mary Eliza Mahoney has been an inspiration to thousands of men
and women of color who are part of the nursing profession.
Bibliography Source::
Bolden, Tony.
The Book of African-American Women: 150 Crusaders,
Creators, and Uplifters. Adams Media
Corporation, 1996.
Kazickas, Jurate, and Lynn Sherr.
Susan B. Anthony Slept Here.
A Guide to American Women's
Landmarks. Random House, 1994
Weatherford, Doris.
American Women's History.
Prentice
Hall General Reference, 1994
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updated 30 September
2007
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