Iowa Women in Health and Medicine: An Iowa Women's Archives Resource Guide: Nurses
A guide to primary sources held at the Iowa Women's Archives that feature women in the medical profession including physicians, nurses, midwives, and pharmacists.
Nurses: Introduction
This page lists collections of nurses and a small number of lay practitioners in women's health clinics. Because of the size of this section, the list has been split into four groups: Military Nurses, Rural Nurses, Nurse Midwives & Maternal Health, and Nurses, General. You can use the links below to navigate to different sections:
From the Geraldene Felton papers
Lt. Col. Geraldene Felton at work.
From the Margaret Langland Johnson papers
Margaret Langland with friends while serving at the 5th Evacuation Hospital in Belgium c. 1944.
From the Evelyn Crary Bacon papers
A selection of Evelyn Crary Bacon's medals.
From the Mavis Stoner papers
Mavis Stoner was known for helping people in Cherokee County, Iowa, through difficult times. As an Iowa Nurse of Hope, she educated Iowans about cancer and prepared them to face a tough diagnosis.
From the Sister Molly Muñoz papers
This Des Moines Register article from 2005 describes Muñoz' mission to serve the medical needs of agricultural laborers in Muscatine County, Iowa.
From the Arlene Jens papers
As an advocate for sex education and reproductive rights, Arlene Jens collected promotional materials from different sides of national debates.
From the Des Moines BirthPlace records
The Des Moines BirthPlace offered an alternative to standard hospital births by supporting a variety of birthing positions.
From the Mary Patricia Donahue papers
Mary Patricia Donahue published widely on oncology and terminal illness. She shared her expertise with practicing nurses.
From the Martha Eimen papers
Martha Eimen's work for the UN took her to locations across the Middle East where she sometimes lived and practiced medicine in tents such as these.
From the Marie Tener Havel papers
Marie Tener Havel is pictured here in front of the University of Iowa's hospital. She worked there from 1948 to 1965. Her career spanned such medical breakthroughs as the polio vaccine.
Military Nurses
-
Andrews, Neta (1895 - 1981)Papers, 1919 – 1922. 2.5 linear inches. Andrews’ papers focus exclusively on her early nursing career with an emphasis on her education at the Army School of Nursing at Walter Reed Hospital in Washington D.C. and her service at the Camp McClellan Base Hospital in Alabama. Researchers will find Andrews’ Red Cross appointment information, an Army Red Cross yearbook, and her uniform. A souvenir book from Camp McClellan base hospital documents life at the Camp including many images and a poem about the flu pandemic that occurred during Andrews’ time there.
-
Aydelotte, Myrtle Kitchell (1917 - 2010)Papers, 1934 – 2001. 21 linear feet. Aydelotte enlisted in the Army Nurse Corps in 1942 and served in North Africa, Italy, and the United Kingdom, eventually rising to the rank of captain. However, her papers focus almost exclusively on her career as a professor and as Dean of the College of Nursing at the University of Iowa. Researchers interested in her military service will find reference to it in the Employment series’ Army sub-series and in the Biographical series of her papers in folders entitled “Oral history interview,” Army reminiscences,” and “Summary of Army experience.”
-
Bacon, Evelyn Crary (1916 - 1997)Papers, 1917 – 2000. 2.3 linear feet. Evelyn Crary received a GN from the University of Iowa in 1940 and entered the U.S. Army Nurse Corps two years later as a Red Cross nurse. Bacon served in the Corps for four years, becoming a captain and participating in the invasion of Normandy. After World War II, Bacon earned a master’s in nursing education and served as a professor in several colleges and universities. Her collection includes newspaper articles about her teaching career, professional certificates, and medals and pins from her military career.
-
Calderon, Barbara M. (1915 - 1999)Papers, 1945 - 1968. 0.25 linear inches. Barbara McDonald Calderon served in the Army Nurse Corps for three years and rose to the rank of 1st lieutenant. She was stationed in Ft. Huachuca, Arizona, and San Luis Obispo, California. After the war, she worked in public health, becoming Iowa's first Black public health nurse. She spent most of her remaining career, however, in veteran’s healthcare. Her collection comprises of a few photographs, a personnel newsletter summarizing her career, photocopies of newspaper articles in which she was featured, and a Veterans Administration Hospital report on nursing utilization.
-
Donahue, Mary Patricia (1939 - 2023)Papers, 1872 – 2006. Donahue’s papers focus mostly on her career. However, the papers of her friend, nursing historian Teresa Christy’s work makes up one series. This includes a 1969 interview with Lucile Petry Leone, the founding director of the Cadet Nurse Corps. The Cadet Nurse Corps was a U.S. government program that paid for nursing students’ educational expenses in exchange for their service in essential nursing, military or civilian, for the duration of the war.
-
Felton, Geraldene, (1926 - )Papers, 1951 – 2004. 9 linear inches. Geraldene Felton, originally from Norfolk, Virginia, had a long career in the Army Nurse Corps before making her mark in Iowa. She served from 1949 to 1975, rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, and was cited for meritorious service in Korea while stationed in a Mobile Army Surgical Unit. After retiring from the Army Nurse Corps, she had an academic career including fourteen years as Dean of Nursing at the University of Iowa. The majority of Felton’s papers are made up of her academic work, but they also include folders of newspaper articles related to her career, photographs, and a several-page autobiographical statement articulating her philosophy of nursing.
-
Johnson, Margaret Langland (1912 - 1972)Papers, 1925 – 1972. 5 linear inches. Margaret Langland Johnson served in the Army Nurse Corps from 1942 to 1946. Her years of service included posts at the 5th Evacuation Hospital in Belgium and in Normandy after D-Day. Johnson’s papers are centered on her Army career during World War II and include handwritten letters home, a printed souvenir book from the 5th Evacuation Hospital, and a variety of official correspondence covering her posts, pay, and promotion to 1st Lieutenant. The collection wraps up with a photograph album filled with informal pictures of Johnson and her fellow service members around the European theater.
-
Liers, Louise (1887 - 1983)Papers, 1911 – 1983. 7 linear inches. Originally from Clayton, Iowa, Liers trained as a nurse at St. Luke’s Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, where she specialized in obstetrics. She enrolled in the Red Cross in 1916 and spent two years as a member of the Army Nurse Corps serving at an Army hospital in northern France. Most of her papers concern her time in the Army Nurse Corps. They include a binder of letters she sent home, a photograph album with images of the hospital and its surrounding area, and a scrapbook that includes official correspondence, manuals, and patriotic songs. The collection also includes the transcript of a short interview with Liers in which she reminisced about her life during World War I.
Rural Nursing
-
Block, Marjorie Jean Bertalot (1923 - 2007)Papers, 1998. 1 linear inch. Block documented her nursing career and life on the farm in two short collections of reminiscences: “My Story” and “Nursing Experiences.” Together they refer to her education and enrollment in the Cadet Nurse Corps during World War II, and her time working nights in rural hospitals near Garrison, Iowa, and Shellsburg, Iowa, while she and her husband farmed during the days.
-
Central Iowa Family Planning (1973 - 2016)Records, 2 linear feet. Central Iowa Family Planning (CIFP) provided needs-based medical care and sex education to Marshalltown, Iowa, Grinnell, Iowa, and the surrounding rural areas, serving a total of six counties. The records focus on CIFP’s sex education programs and include examples of birth control such as cervical caps, diaphragms, and spermicide. The newspaper clippings and letters to the editor in the Publicity series provide a window into Iowans’ opinions on topics such as abortion, AIDS prevention as a part of sex education, and the HPV vaccine.
-
Fassbinder, Barbara (1953 - 1994)Papers, 1958 – 2004. 6 linear inches. Fassbinder, a resident of rural northeastern Iowa, contracted HIV in 1986 while working as a nurse in an emergency room in a 49-bed hospital in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin. She was one of the first health care professionals in the United States to become infected with HIV on the job. Her papers focus on her experience and her advocacy for legislation related to HIV and AIDS. Many articles in her collection refer to a feeling in rural hospitals that diseases like HIV and AIDS would not touch their area and so universal precautions such as latex gloves were not always followed. Fassbinder’s papers also include her Congressional testimony and several digitized news segments.
-
Muñoz, Sister Irene (1936 - )Papers, 1973 – 2006. 0.25 linear inches. Sister Irene Muñoz and her sister Molly both joined the Sisters of Humility of Mary as young women. They worked as public health nurses serving Spanish-speaking agricultural laborers near Muscatine, Iowa. Her papers, an interview transcript and an additional folder of clippings and correspondence, refer to her work on behalf of Spanish-speaking migrants in Iowa. They are shelved with her oral history interview in the Mujeres Latinas Oral History Project records.
-
Muñoz, Sister Maria Luisa "Molly"Papers, 1972 – 2006. 0.25 linear inches. Sister Molly Muñoz and her sister Irene both joined the Sisters of Humility of Mary as young women. They worked as public health nurses serving Spanish-speaking agricultural laborers near Muscatine, Iowa. Muñoz was once arrested for criminal trespassing when her work took her to laborers living on a grower’s land. Her papers include a copy of her arrest record, a letter in her defense from her Bishop which describes her work, and correspondence related to the case. Her papers have been incorporated into the Mujeres Latinas Oral History Project records.
-
Stoner, Mavis (1928 - 2019)Papers, 1918 – 1998. 0.25 linear inches. Mavis Stoner and her husband owned a Century Farm in Cherokee County, Iowa, and Stoner spent most of her career as a rural public health nurse. Her collection has just a handful of documents. Photocopies of newspaper articles document that she incorporated humor and music into her treatments. She also participated in the Iowa Nurse of Hope Program, which sent nurses to small groups to educate Iowans about cancer and alleviate their fears.
Nurse Midwives and Maternal Health
-
Andrews, Neta (1895 - 1981)Papers, 1919 – 1922. 2.5 linear inches. Neta Andrews served in the Army Nurse Corps shortly after World War I and most of her papers concern her service. However, her training focused on obstetrics, so the papers also include a 1919 pamphlet entitled “Painless childbirth and the Safe Conduct of Labor.”
-
Bacon, Esther (1916 - 1972)Papers, 1936 – 1994. 17.5 linear inches. A Lutheran missionary, Bacon practiced nursing and midwifery in Zorzor, Liberia for 41 years until her death from Lassa fever in 1972. Her papers almost exclusively focus on her work at the Hospital of Maternal and Child Health at Zorzor. They include many articles from Lutheran publications exalting her work, photographs of her with patients and other nurses, and posthumous testimonies from those who knew her. The correspondence series has letters from Bacon to her aunt in Iowa, in which she discusses her work. Additionally, the papers house several reports Bacon wrote about people treated in the hospital at Zorzor, an illustrated, handwritten summary of her work in Liberia, and history of the German Lutheran Hospital of Sioux City, Iowa, where she trained as a nurse. Finally, there is a copy of the 1992 book "Outlaw for God: The Esther Bacon Story" by J. Birney Dibble.
-
Hornstein, Frances "Francie" (1947 - )Papers, 1972 – 1999. 15 linear inches. In 1972, Hornstein left Iowa for California to join the Feminist Women’s Health Clinic, Self Help Clinic One. Her papers include publications, brochures, and more related to many aspects of the feminist women’s health movement. These include abortion, menstrual extraction, self-examinations, lesbian health care, menopause, and population control. The court cases series covers Downer v. Florida in which women’s health activist Carol Downer was charged with trespassing after entering the Tallahassee Memorial Hospital to inspect the conditions of its maternity facilities without authorization.
-
Jens, Arlene (1926 - 2014)Papers, 1962 – 2006. 12.25 linear inches. Besides being a professional nurse specializing in nursing home care, Jens was a career-long activist for sex education, contraception, and abortion rights. Through her papers, researchers can learn about debates surrounding these topics in Iowa from the 1960s and 1970s. Her papers include materials from Iowa’s chapter of the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL), sex education pamphlets aimed at students, newspaper clippings outlining debates about sex education in public schools, and several pamphlets from Iowa’s Right to Life, an anti-abortion organization.
-
Liers, Louise (1887 - 1983)Papers, 1911 – 1983. 7 linear inches. Originally from Clayton, Iowa, Liers trained as a nurse at St. Luke’s Hospital in Chicago, Illinois where she specialized in obstetrics. She was a founding staff member of St. Luke’s obstetrical and maternity department. After serving in the Army Nurse Corps during World War I, she returned to Iowa and worked as a private nurse for the community around Elkader, Iowa. Liers estimated that she was present at around 3,000 births throughout her career. In the biographical folder of her collection, there are several newspaper clippings documenting when the people of Elkader purchased a car for Liers to show their gratitude for all the miles she’d driven to attend nearly 300 births in the surrounding area over fifteen years.
-
Lyford, Marjorie Elizabeth (1910 - 2004)Papers, 1865 – 2002. 4.6 linear feet. Prior to her career as a nursing professor and dean at the University of Iowa, Lyford specialized in child and maternal health. In the Nursing Career series of her papers, researchers will find a scrapbook related to a public health program she staffed in Des Moines, Iowa, in which Lyford taught expectant mothers the basics of infant care.
-
Patten, Grace Wagner (1888 - 1957)Papers, Wagner Family papers, 1903 – 1957. 2 linear inches. Grace Patten’s papers include a handful of items related to her nursing career. Patten worked as a midwife and nurse in and around Mason City, Iowa. Her materials include a photograph in her nursing uniform, a note of her qualifications to work at Rochester State Hospital, and a small notebook. In between recipes, the notebook houses a list of births she attended and the names and ailments of other patients she saw during the 1930s and 1940s.
-
Small, Ruth Ann (1931 - )Papers, 1956 – 2017. 2.5 linear inches. Small’s papers hold materials broadly related to the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinic’s urology department. It includes a 1975 Daily Iowan profile of University of Iowa urologist, Dr. Raymond Bunge. In the piece Bunge discusses his clinical experience with intersex patients and with treating infertility. Bunge created the first sperm bank and, as part of a team, engineered the first successful human pregnancy from frozen sperm. His papers are held in the University of Iowa Archives.
-
Zimmerman, Jo Ann (1936 - 2019)Papers, 1958 – 1995. 9 linear feet. Zimmerman was the first woman lieutenant governor of Iowa. Prior to that she had a career as a nurse. Many of Zimmerman’s political achievements were related to healthcare. In her oral history interview in the Biographical series of her collection, and in her political career series, researchers will find references to her efforts to reduce teen pregnancy, to expand obstetrical care in rural areas, and to promote the Lamaze method of childbirth through La Leche League.
Nurses, General
-
Becker, Ruth Salzmann (1922 - 2007)Papers, 1858 – 2012. 4.75 linear feet. As a young Jewish woman, Ruth Salzmann fled Nazi Germany in 1939. She settled in the United States where she became a nurse. Her papers include photographs, correspondence, and a yearbook from her days as a nursing student at Mt. Sinai Hospital School of Nursing. Additionally, there are appointment papers from her years working at the University of Iowa’s College of Nursing, and documentation of her role in founding Iowa City Hospice.
-
Burdette, Lucille (1919 - 2014)Papers, 2009. 1 linear inch. Lucille Williamson Burdette was a medical missionary in Nigeria from 1947 to 1971. In her memoir, she details her calling to be both a nurse and a missionary and shares small images of her life abroad. In Nigeria, she treated many patients with Hansen’s disease (then called leprosy) and encountered patients and colleagues with Lassa fever.
-
Carter, Lucille Ketchum (1913 - 2009)Papers, 1936 – 2008. 12 linear inches. Ketchum graduated from the School of Nursing at the State University of Iowa (today the University of Iowa) in 1936. However, her papers provide scant information on her education and career. A folder entitled "Nursing" includes evidence of her enrollment as a Red Cross Nurse and a few items from the University of Iowa such as a commencement program and class reunion correspondence. Additionally, there is one photograph of her in a nursing uniform.
-
Cousin, Ruth Hager (1895 - 1994)Papers, 1914 – 1985. 5 linear inches. Ruth Hager Cousin attended the Illinois Training School for Nurses from 1917 to 1920. Her years there are documented in a scrapbook in her papers. The photographs include images of patients and different wards in the hospital including one for contagious patients and another for infants. Cousin’s papers also include a transcript of a brief interview with her daughter focused on her nursing career.
-
Donahue, Mary Patricia (1939 - 2023)Papers, 1872 – 2006. 3 linear feet. Donahue’s papers cover her professional career in which she published widely about oncology, terminal illness, and the history of American nursing. Most of her papers are taken up with her publications, including the book “Nursing, the Finest Art: An Illustrated History.” Other highlights include Donahue’s ongoing correspondence with Yamanishi School of Nursing in Japan, which culminated in a faculty exchange with the University of Iowa in 2002, and a 1969 interview with Lucile Petry Leone, the founding director of the Cadet Nurse Corps, conducted by nursing historian, Teresa E. Christy.
-
Eimen, Martha (1912 - 2023)Papers, 1945 – 1995. 2.5 linear inches. Martha Eimen worked for the Public Health Service and the United Nations from 1944 to 1948. Her job took her to Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and British Palestine. The collection provides little detail about her work but has an abundance of photographs depicting life in the Middle East in the 1940s.
-
Hartline, Lois Plummer (1931 - 2021)Papers, 2021. 0.25 linear inches. Hartline’s papers have only one item, a brief memoir of her life that includes recollections of her nursing education and career as a school nurse from 1954 to 2004.
-
Havel, Marie Tener (1910 - 2002)Papers, 1931 – 1997. 2.5 linear inches. Marie Tener worked for the University of Iowa Hospitals as the Director of Nursing Services. Her collection includes newspaper clippings related to her career there. A folder entitled “Memories by Marie Havel” holds a short memoir in which she shared details from her training as a public nurse in Chicago and what it was like to be a nurse when the polio vaccine arrived.
-
Hauth, Mary Ungerer (1890 - 1963)Papers, 1905 – 1948. 2.75 linear inches. Hauth’s papers include the results of her 1913 nursing exam, a substantial handwritten notebook with class notes, and several pictures of herself and other nurses in uniform from the 1910s.
-
Jens, Arlene (1926 - 2014)12.25 linear inches. At work, Arlene Jens provided care to the elderly by directing the Davenport Lutheran Home for the Aged and offering in-service workshops for nursing homes in eastern Iowa from the 1970s to the 1990s. Her collection reflects this with detailed in-service programs and binders on patient rights and nursing home law. Jens also lent her professional expertise to the causes of sex education and abortion rights. Her papers include newspaper clippings and pamphlets on sex education in schools and documents from the Iowa National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL), of which she was a member.
-
Kollman, Käthe (1900 - 1984)Papers, 1910 – 2007. 4.5 linear feet. Käthe Kollman was a pediatric nurse in Vienna prior to World War II. Because she was Jewish, she lost her position when Nazis overtook Austria. After immigrating to the United States, she became a practical nurse and worked in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Materials related to her career include newspaper articles from the Cedar Rapids Gazette, photographs from hospitals where she worked in Vienna, and a brief memoir. These are housed in her sister-in-law, Gusti Kollman’s, papers.
-
Shoots, Jean (1926 - unknown)Papers, 1990 – 1998. Shoots spent most of her nursing career as a registered nurse in the Veterans’ Hospital in Iowa City. Shoots’ small collection largely documents her life after she retired. The newspaper articles about her focus on her volunteer service as a member of the Retired Senior Volunteer Program.
-
Small, Ruth Ann (1931 - )2.5 linear inches. After graduating from the University of Iowa’s College of Nursing in 1953 Small held several positions in the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinic’s (UIHC) urology department. Small’s papers feature her work as well as that of the department and the hospital at large. The collection includes promotional materials for the UIHC and the College of Nursing from the 1960s, letters of appreciation from patients, and a 1981 issue of The Iowa Nurse which features a profile of Small.
-
Zimmerman, Jo Ann (1936 - 2019)Papers, 1958 – 1995. 9 linear feet. Jo Ann Zimmerman believed that politics was “a lot like nursing.” In the Iowa House of Representatives and as Lieutenant Governor, Zimmerman advocated for a variety of health-related policies with particular attention to rural healthcare, obstetrical care, and mental health. Researchers will find a summation of her health-related activities in the Iowa government and through organizations such as the La Leche League and the Iowa Nurses’ Association in the 1991 oral history housed in the Biographical series of her collection. Other official documents, speeches, notes, and newspaper articles can be found in the Political Career series.
From the Neta Andrews papers
The cover of a souvenir book from Camp McClellan, Alabama, 1919. Neta Andrews was a nurse in the camp's hospital shortly after WWI.
From the Louise Liers papers
Members of the Army Nurse Corps in their rainy weather uniforms while serving in northern France during WWI.
Returning members of the Army Nurse Corps like Liers were welcomed back to the U.S. by members of Trinity Church, Broadway and Wall Street, who offered to house them temporarily and give them tours of the city while they waited for transport back to their home states.
From the Barbara Calderon papers
The Veterans' Hospital in Palo Alto, California, welcomed new Chief Nurse Barbara Calderon in their personnel bulletin, 1968.
From the Barbara Fassbinder papers
The Barbara Fassbinder Story documents Fassbinder's illness and political advocacy after contracting HIV on the job at a rural hospital. It is available for viewing in the Iowa Digital Library.
From the Marjorie Lyford papers
This cartoon shows some slices of life in a typical mother and baby ward of the early 20th century.
From the Esther Bacon papers
Esther Bacon spent decades in Zorzor, Liberia, reducing infant mortality rates and training new medical personnel to continue the work. After her sudden death, many wrote tributes to her life and work like this one from John Gay of Monrovia, Liberia.
From the Patricia Hillard papers
Patricia Hillard's papers encompass many methods of promoting breastfeeding through the La Leche League, such as this advertisement from 1992.
From the Ruth Salzmann Becker papers
After escaping Nazi Germany, Ruth Salzmann became a nurse in the United States. Later in life, she helped found Iowa City Hospice to help care for the dying in her new hometown.
From the Ruth Ann Small papers
Ruth Ann Small became the supervisor of the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics' Department of Urology in 1963.
From the Jo Ann Zimmerman papers
Jo Ann Zimmerman's nursing background was useful in her work at the Iowa Health Systems Agency and in Iowa's state government.