Virginia Avenel Henderson
Born: November 30, 1897, Kansas City, Missouri
Died: March 19, 1996, Branford, Connecticut
Parents: Daniel B. and Lucy A. Henderson
Education:
Early education at home in Virginia with her aunts, her sister and an uncle, Charles Abbott, at his school for boys in the community
Army School of Nursing, Washington, D.C., Graduated 1921
Teachers College, Columbia University, BS, 1931; MS, 1934
Career in Nursing:
Henry Street Visiting Nurse Association, New York, New York, 1921
Visiting Nurse Association, Washington, D.C., 1923-1924
Norfolk Protestant Hospital, Norfolk, Virginia, Instructor and Educational Director, 1924-1929
Strong Memorial Hospital, Rochester, New York, Supervisor and Clinical Instructor, Outpatient Department, 1930
Teachers College, Columbia University, New York, Instructor and Associate Professor, 1934-1948
Yale University School of Nursing, New Haven, Connecticut, Research Associate, 1953-1971; Research Associate Emeritus, 1971-1996
Bibliography
Virginia Avenel Henderson has been called the "first lady of nursing" and the "first truly international nurse." Her writing, her presentations and her research and contacts with nurses have profoundly affected nursing and impacted the recipients of care by nurses throughout the world. She began her career in public health nursing in the Henry Street Settlement and in the visiting nurse service in Washington, D.C. She was the first full-time instructor in nursing in Virginia when she was at Norfolk Protestant Hospital in Norfolk. While in the state, she was active in the Graduate Nurses Association of Virginia. She designed a plan to create district organizations within the state. She was an early advocate for the inclusion of psychiatric nursing in the curriculum and served on a committee to develop such a course at Eastern State Hospital in Williamsburg, Virginia in 1929.
During her years at Teachers College, Columbia University, Henderson was an outstanding teacher and drew students from many countries to study with her. Nurses through the United States studied with her without ever leaving their home schools when her revision of Bertha Harmer's Textbook of the Principles and Practice of Nursing became widely use. Other important publications grew out of Henderson's years at Yale University including Nursing Research A Survey and Assessment in collaboration with Leo Simonds. She also directed a twelve-year project entitled Nursing Studies Index, four volumes recognized as an essential reference for many years. Henderson's book, Nature of Nursing, published in 1966 expressed her belief about the essence of nursing and influenced the hearts and minds of those who read it.
At the age of 75, Henderson directed her career to international teaching and speaking. This enabled another generation to reap the benefits of contact with this quintessential nurse of the twentieth century.
The honors bestowed on Henderson are numerous. To mention just a few, she held honorary degrees from thirteen universities; she was selected to American Nurses Association Hall of Fame and had the Sigma Theta Tau International Library named in her honor. She was honored by the Virginia Nurses Association in 1988 when the Virginia Historical Nurse Leadership Award was presented to her. In 2000, the Virginia Nurses Association recognized Henderson as one of fifty-one Pioneer Nurses in Virginia.
