Mary D French

Legacy of Nursing at Albany Medical Center Mary D French

The Legacy of Nursing at Albany Medical Center is a visual journey through nursing history at Albany Medical Center from the founding of Albany Hospital Training School for Nurses in 1897 to the accomplishments of present-day nurses. Early nurses operated under the mandate "All nursing necessary for the hospital," and their duties included cleaning, preparing special diets, and caring for patients. Nurses gave twenty-four-hour-a-day care during the flu epidemic of 1918, provided military health care during both world wars, and manned the iron lungs during the polio epidemics of the 1940s and 1950s. Today, nurses at Albany Medical Center continue at the forefront of sophisticated, high-tech medical care.

The Legacy of Nursing at Albany Medical Center follows nursing from the age of strict curfews and required nursing uniforms to the modern era of greater nursing freedom and responsibility. As nursing practice evolved, so did attire. Hats, gloves, high collars, caps, and ankle-length dresses gave way to above-the-knee hemlines, pantsuits, scrubs, and bare heads. Among celebrated Albany graduates are Anne Strong (class of 1906), inducted into the Nursing Hall of Fame, and Nancy Cameron (class of 1900), decorated with the Royal Red Cross and received by Queen Alexandra during World War I.