Willeford, Mary B. (1900–1941)

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Willeford, Mary B. (1900–1941)

American nurse-midwife. Born Mary Bristow Willeford, Feb 4, 1900, in Flatonia, TX; died Dec 24, 1941, in New York, NY; dau. of Ellen (Bristow) Willeford and William Willeford; University of Texas at Austin, AB, 1920; Columbia University Teachers College, MA in public health, 1927; Columbia University, PhD, 1932.

One of the 1st nurses in America to earn a doctorate, enrolled in a York Lying-In Hospital midwifery course in London (1926); began work as a district nurse-midwife at Mary Breckinridge's Frontier Nursing Service (Aug 1926); with 16 others, was a charter member of Kentucky State Association of Midwives (1928), later the American Association of Nurse-Midwives; traveled to England (1929) and earned a midwifery teaching certificate; served as the FNS assistant director (1930–38); appointed maternal and child health consultant to California State Board of Health (1938); became public health nursing consultant to the federal Children's Bureau in Washington, DC (1940), and helped to establish the Tuskegee Institute's midwifery school in Alabama.

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Willeford, Mary B. (1900–1941)

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