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Jane Addams Facts

Jane Addams Facts
Jane Addams was an American woman who is most well-known for her work helping the poor, women's suffrage, world peace, and for winning a Nobel Peace Prize. She was born Laura Jane Addams on September 6th, 1860, In Cedarville, Illinois, to John H. Addams, a businessman and state senator, and Sarah Weber Addams. Jane's mother died when she was two, and Jane was the youngest of eight children. Abraham Lincoln was a friend of Jane's father, and she grew up well educated and fairly wealthy. She graduated in 1881 from the Seminary and attended medical school for a brief period, before discovering her passion for helping the less fortunate.
Interesting Jane Addams Facts:
Jane Addams rejected the idea of getting married and having children in order to spend her life working for social reform, peace, and settlement work.
Jane Addams read an article in 1887 in a magazine about the first settlement house in the world - Toynbee House in London.
Jane Addams visited Toynbee House while on vacation in Europe. This inspired her to open a settlement house in Chicago in 1889 called Hull House.
Jane Addams founded Hull House with a college friend named Ellen Gates Starr.
The Hull House was a run-down mansion and Jane used her own money to pay for many capital costs in the beginning. As time went on more donors helped with the settlement house, enabling it to expand its services.
The Hull House provided services to the poor people and immigrants in Chicago's region.
Jane Addams and Ellen Starr were the first two residents of Hull House. Eventually 25 women lived there and when operating at its peak there were approximately 2000 people visiting Hull House every week.
Hull House had a variety of social facilities including a night school, children's clubs, kitchen, art gallery, library, theater, apartments, lunchroom, employment office, a gym, and it provided social services training to social workers.
Jane Addams eventually grew Hull House to 13 buildings.
Some of the services offered to people through Hull House were legal aid, medical care, job search help, training, counseling and assistance in many areas of life.
Jane Addams published Newer Ideals of Peace in 1907, based on her beliefs about ending war and establishing peace.
Jane Addams was appointed the chair of the Women's Peace Party after the outbreak of World War I. She attended the International Congress of Women at the Hague in 1915 in the Netherlands, along with Alice Hamilton and Emily Greene Balch.
The three women Addams, Hamilton, and Balch published Women at the Hague: The International Congress of Women and Its Results in 1915.
Jane Addams serves at the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom from 1919 to 1929, which helped to earn her the Nobel Peace Prize in 1931.
Jane Addams was one of the founders of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
Jane Addams had suffered from health problems since a young girl, and in 1926 she had a heart attack.
On May 21st, 1935 Jane Addams died in Chicago, at the age of 74.


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