The History of Professional Nursing in North Carolina, 1902–2002

The History of Professional Nursing in North Carolina, 1902-2002 won the Willie Parker Peace History Book Award, announced by the North Carolina Society of Historians at their 2014 award ceremony.

The History of Professional Nursing in North Carolina, 1902-2002 is the first comprehensive exploration of nursing history in the state since 1938. The scholarship on the history of health, illness, medicine, and public health is largely either physician-centered or focuses on specific health care institutions. The history of nursing has been comparatively ignored. Nursing's emergence as a profession in the early twentieth century and the influence nursing has had on the quality of life of virtually every resident and every health care institution in North Carolina in its first 100 years is a compelling story.

Nursing is an occupation and role that touches everyone. Most people are related to nurses; virtually everyone has received care from nurses. Yet, they tend to be somewhat invisible. The individual experiences of nurses and the unique development of nursing organizations, education, and practice have received scant attention from scholars. This book enhances the historical record by recounting the triumphs of individual nurses and the political and professional successes and failures professional nursing has experienced in its first century.

This book is unique in its inclusion of accounts of and from African American, Cherokee, and male nurses. Readers interested in the histories of North Carolina and its counties, health care, labor, professionalization, education, and the expansion of women's roles in society should find this book thought-provoking.

"An experienced historian and nurse educator, Dr. Phoebe Pollitt skillfully intertwines information from a variety of sources, including letters, diaries, and personal interviews, as she walks readers through the development of professional nursing in North Carolina. Descriptive chapter and section titles, as well as extensive indexing and referencing, make this book a useful tool for researchers, while the gentle tone and flow of the writing keep it accessible to lay readers." — Gina Cahoon Firnhaber, East Carolina University, for North Carolina Libraries

"Pollitt's history of the nursing profession in North Carolina is well organized and highly readable…It will appeal to any nursing professional or student." — The North Carolina Historical Review

"...Pollitt successfully documents North Carolina nurses' contributions to the advancement of the profession [...] Unique in its focus on one state's history of professional nursing, the book will prove insightful to historians of health care and to nurses, educators, and anyone interested in the specifics of North Carolina's history." — Arlene W. Keeling, The Journal of Southern History