Evanston Hospital School of Nursing: 1898-1984

Using historical images and recollections, Evanston Hospital School of Nursing: 1898-1984 highlights the marketing, education, curriculum, and values of EHSN as well as the students’ experience and dormitory life.

Evanston Hospital was founded in 1891, followed by the school of nursing seven years later. Evanston Hospital School of Nursing (EHSN) provided education at a reasonable cost while the students provided care to patients in between studies. In its first 50 years, the school graduated 1,157 nurses, with the first class of two graduating in 1901. EHSN, like other diploma programs, flourished until educational cost escalated, technology boomed, training methods evolved, and a conversation about where and how nurses should be educated began. After 86 years of training nurses, EHSN closed.

Carolyn Hope Smeltzer and Barbara Ann McQuillan, 1972 EHSN graduates, are proud of their education and realize the historical value of the program. Having graduated 50 years ago, they are passionate about preserving the school’s history and capturing classmates’ memories. Their desire to keep alive EHSN history enables past generations of diploma graduates to cherish their own memories and future generations of nurses to look back on past teaching practices. This book will elicit familiar fond memories for all who attended or taught in any diploma school of nursing.