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  Georgia Ledford, August 17,…

  Members of Georgia Ledford's family have served on the Clay County Committee of the FNS and have worked for the FNS in various capacities. Ledford recalls her…
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  Glenda Davis, May 17, 1978

  Glenda Davis was born in 1919 in Clay County, where no professional medical assistance was available. As a child, she became acquainted with the Clara Ford…
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  Jessie Shephard, August 22,…

  Jessie Shephard was born in 1913 and grew up on Ellis' Branch. Her father helped to build Wendover in the 1920s, and she recalls a Christmas party given by…
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  Sophia Couch, August 22, 1978

  Sophia Couch was born in l889 on Short Creek in Leslie County. She relates her grandfather's encounter with Native Americans in Harlan and her grandmother's…
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  Dan Young, August 28, 1978

  Dan Young was born in 1897 and worked in the coal mines in the vicinity of Hazard beginning in 1916. He discusses mining operations and attempts at…
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  Tempie Young, August 29, 1978

  Tempie Young was born on Cutshin Creek in 1905. She began to work in the fields when she was six, and she describes the usual farm chores. When Young was a…
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  Mary Marvin Breckinridge…

  Mary Marvin Breckinridge Patterson (known most widely as Marvin Breckinridge or Marvin Breckinridge Patterson), a second cousin of Mary Breckinridge, was the…
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  John F. Caldwell, July 6,…

  John Caldwell, a long-time resident of Leslie County, comments upon farming, logging, digging ginseng, raising bees and hunting rattlesnakes. He has had little…
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  Ed Morgan, July 7, 1978

  Ed Morgan's father made land available to Mary Breckinridge for the establishment of FNS headquarters at Wendover. Morgan discusses the building of Wendover in…
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  Matt Gray, July 21, 1978

  Matt Gray's parents taught him to deliver babies and to treat illnesses. He describes various treatments and remedies used by the mountain people and provides…
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  Jailey Sizemore, July 26, 1978

  Jailey Sizemore describes Hyden before World War I and talks about Court Day. Other activities she recalls include corn hoeings and dances, and she answers…
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  Betty Lester, March 3, 1978

  Betty Lester gives some background of the Breckinridges and of Mary Breckinridge's immediate family. She also indicates the personal circumstances that led to…
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  Frank Bowling, July 31, 1978

  Frank Bowling tells of going to a three-room school about 1907. He discusses slavery as it once existed in the mountains and recalls his acquaintance with…
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  Martha Lady, August 4, 1978

  Martha Lady took her midwifery training at the FNS School of Midwifery in Hyden in 1960-61 and became a nurse-midwife in Africa. She describes the similarities…
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  Lawrence Bowling, August 10,…

  Lawrence Bowling gives details of growing up in the mountains in the l930s and going to school in a one-room schoolhouse. He tells of celebrating Christmas…
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  Clyde Brewer, Mary Taylor…

  Mary Brewer came to Leslie County as a social worker with the WPA program in 1939. She published a collection of Leslie County stories entitled Of Bolder Men,…
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  Roe Davidson, July 20, 1978

  Roe Davidson, a farmer and coal miner, recalls Hyden before the first car came to the area. He indicates that before the FNS arrived he was treated by an herb…
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  Alden Gay, September 1, 1978

  Alden Gay was hired to feed and water the nurses' horses while the FNS outpost center at Brutus was being constructed in 1930. At that time the area had no…
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  Shiloh Gay, September 8, 1978

  Shiloh Gay was born around 1890 and recalls some early settlers on Big Bullskin Creek as well as details of daily life in the late 1800s. He tells about salt…
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  Della Gay, September 8, 1978

  Della Gay was a young woman in the 1920s, and she talks about life on a mountain farm--grinding corn, making molasses, stringing beans, and performing other…
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  Shiloh Gay, September 8, 1978

  Shiloh Gay talks about his family history, including his Irish heritage and the family members that settled in Virginia and on Big Bullskin Creek in Kentucky.…
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  Felix Shepherd, September 11,…

  Felix Shepherd talks about his life in Leslie County on Rockhouse Creek, and mentions such things as the various native fruits available when he was growing up.…
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  Albert Bowling, September 12,…

  Albert Bowling worked for the Brutus Center in the early days of the FNS, and speaks of the nurses' rounds on horseback. He recalls FNS fees as one dollar per…
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  Nancy Barnes, September 12,…

  Nancy Barnes was delivered by Betty Lester, and tells of working for the Bowlingtown [Bullskin Creek] Center when she was sixteen. Besides taking care of the…
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  Oscar Howard, September 22,…

  Oscar Howard has lived on the same farm in Leslie County all his life, having bought the family home from his father. Howard has worked as a farmer, a…
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  Helen H. Fortune, Carl H.…

  Helen Fortune's father [W. A. Hifner, Jr.] was Mary Breckinridge's accountant in the early days of the FNS, and Helen was the first female CPA. Fortune recalls…
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  Mary Wilson, October 6, 1978

  Mary Wilson discusses assistance to the FNS as a special project of the Daughters of the Colonial Wars, beginning in 1950. She explains membership in the DCW,…
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  Louise Ackerman, October 6,…

  At the time of the interview Louise Ackerman was president of the Daughters of the Colonial Wars, an organization that has assisted the Frontier Nursing Service…
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  Margaret Gage, October 16,…

  Margaret Gage first encountered Mary Breckinridge when Breckinridge gave a slide presentation on the FNS at Bennett College in the late 1920s. Gage toured the…
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  Barkley Moore, October 26,…

  Barkley Moore discusses the Oneida Baptist Institute and the maternity hospital associated with it. He also tells of a community doctor making rounds on…
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  Artemus Campbell, October 30,…

  Artemus Campbell talks about his childhood in Appalachia and his career in the mining industry. He talks about working when the United Mine Workers of America…
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  Charlie Rice, Alta Rice,…

  Charlie Rice was born in Owsley County in 1896. His father moved the family to Leslie County in 1906 because of the Rice-Gabbard feud. Rice never attended…
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  Albert Benjamin "Happy"…

  Former governor A. B. "Happy" Chandler discusses his accomplishments as governor, including the establishment of the medical school at the University of…
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  Jean Tolk, November 1, 1978

  Before the advent of the FNS, Jean Tolk was familiar with the lack of medical facilities in Leslie County. The Louisville Public Health Department sent her as…
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  Gertrude Isaacs, November 15,…

  Gertrude Isaacs, who has her doctorate in nursing, was co-director of the Family Nurse Practitioner Program with Dr. W. B. Rogers Beasley in 1971, and then was…
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  Ruth Huston, November 18, 1978

  Ruth Huston was originally from Pennsylvania and first visited Hyden in 1924. She was interested in education work being conducted by the Presbyterian Church…
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  Hallie Maggard, November 20,…

  Hallie Maggard recalls Hyden at the turn of the century, with board sidewalks and "stepping stones across the street for the mud." She discusses her…
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  Paul Hensley, November 28,…

  Paul Hensley has been the owner and editor of the Thousandsticks News since 1967, and discusses the role of a small-town newspaper. A native of Leslie County…
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  Phillip Isaacs, November 22,…

  Phillip Isaacs came to Hyden in July of 1971 to supervise construction of the Mary Breckinridge Hospital. He discusses various problems that arose during the…
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  Krit Keen, November 9, 1978

  Krit Keen was born at Bullskin Creek in Leslie County in 1891. He taught school for several years before becoming a retail merchant and postmaster at Buckhorn.…
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  Juder Stidham, Sadie W.…

  Sadie Stidham's father, Isaac Wells, served on the first Frontier Nursing Service committee and attended the organizational meeting in Frankfort. She describes…
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  Elsie Maier, December 5, 1978

  Elsie Maier attended nursing school in New York City, and in 1962 enrolled in a midwifery course at the Frontier Nursing Service school. She subsequently was…
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  Louise Ray, Edward H. Ray,…

  Dr. Edward Ray began his medical practice in Lexington in 1929. He discusses his role in establishing a medical school at the University of Kentucky and his…
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  Ford Barger, December 7, 1978

  Ford Barger's father, a logger and storekeeper in Leslie County at the turn of the century, donated land to the FNS for the establishment of the Bowlingtown…
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  Edna Rockstroh, December 1,…

  Edna Rockstroh was asked by Mary Breckinridge to come to work for the Frontier Nursing Service after she had served in France with the CARD effort (Committee…
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  Carolyn Gay, January 16, 1979

  Carolyn Gay was born in 1948 in Leslie County. She relates school experiences and talks about a woman's role on a mountain farm. Gay also discusses political…
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  Hugo Janutolo, January 18,…

  Hugo Janutolo was born in Virginia in 1907. He moved to Italy with his family at the age of five or six and returned to the U.S. at the age of eighteen. He…
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  Allyn J. Shepherd, January 18,…

  Allyn Shepherd was an FNS courier in early 1942. She describes her duties and tells of her experiences in making the rounds of the outpost centers. Shepherd…
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  Dorothy Caldwell, January 18,…

  Dorothy Caldwell first went to the FNS as a courier in 1935. She discusses her experiences in taking care of the horses at Wendover and going on rounds with…
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  Ann D. Mulhauser, January 17,…

  Anne Mulhauser went to the FNS as a courier in 1935, her mother being on the FNS Board of Governors. Mulhauser tells of her duties and of local attitudes…
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  Grace Reeder, January 25, 1979

  Grace Reeder, a nurse, first learned of the FNS when Mary Breckinridge spoke at a meeting in Cincinnati. After volunteering for a month as a staff nurse at the…
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  Hanna Higgins, January 25,…

  Hannah Higgins first became acquainted with the FNS through a committee meeting in Boston and has helped to raise money for the FNS through various projects. …
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  Susan M. Putnam, Mardi B.…

  Susan Putnam heard Mary Breckinridge lecture in Boston and went to the FNS in 1931 as a courier. She describes the duties of couriers at that time and also…
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  Sue Grandin, Patsy Perrin…

  Patsy Lawrence was a courier with the FNS in the 1950s, and her daughter became a courier and a nurse. Lawrence has been courier chairman in the Boston area…
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  Beatrice Williams, January 26,…

  Beatrice Williams was a member of the American Committee for Devastated France (CARD), established in 1917, and she comments upon the center run by Mary…
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  Molly Lee, February 6, 1979

  Molly Lee came to the FNS from England as a nurse-midwife, having had experience in England, Scotland and Canada. Part of her district nursing experience as a…
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  Mary Lewis Biggerstaff,…

  Mary Biggerstaff was born in Hyden, Kentucky in 1899. Her father was Judge Lou Lewis. She tells of her family's pioneer background and also mentions some early…
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  Katherine Trowbridge Arpee,…

  Katherine Arpee was born in 1903 and heard Mary Breckinridge speak about the FNS in the late 1920s. Arpee went to Wendover as a courier in 1932 and became a…
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  Carlyle Carter, January 20,…

  Carlyle Carter, whose grandmother was a first cousin of Mary Breckinridge, recalls her two-week visit to Wendover at the age of ten and also subsequent visits.…
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  Geraldine Brown, March 4,…

  Geraldine Brown's daughter was an FNS courier, and Brown contrasts the current duties of couriers with those of times past when horses were used. She feels…
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  Martha Webster, March 4, 1979

  Martha Webster tells of her experience as an FNS courier in 1938, recalling the courtesy of the mountaineers and the camaraderie among the nurses. A member of…
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  Edith Vignos, March 4, 1979

  Edith Vignos first heard about Mary Breckinridge from her grandmother, and Vignos visited Wendover in the early 1970s when her daughter was a courier. At the…
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  Barbara B. Webster, March 5,…

  Barbara Webster recalls her experience as an FNS courier just prior to World War Two. She details her responsibilities with the horses and also her association…
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  Nancy N. Porter, March 5,…

  Nancy Porter went to the FNS as a nurse in 1947. She recalls Christmas at Wendover and the preparation of clothing to be given away. Porter served in the…
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  Emily E. Saugman, March 9,…

  Emily Saugman first met Mary Breckinridge while a student at Crescent College in Eureka Springs, Arkansas; during that time Breckinridge married Richard…
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  Leonard Hood, February 2,…

  Reverend Leonard Hood details the history of the Presbyterian Church in Leslie County from its beginning in 1894 and discusses its philosophy. Hood indicates…
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  Leonard Hood, March 16, 1979

  Reverend Leonard Hood was born in West Virginia in 1935 and received his Master of Divinity degree at Louisville Presbyterian Seminary. He became pastor of the…
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  Karen Slabaugh, March 23, 1979

  Karen Slabaugh learned about the FNS while working as a nurse in Costa Rica and subsequently went through FNS family nurse and midwifery training. She gives…
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  Fannie Lewis, March 18, 1979

  Fannie Lewis was born in Leslie County in 1906 and attended a one-room school through the third grade. Her family gathered ginseng--"sang"--and other roots in…
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  Corbin Pennington, March 18,…

  Corbin Pennington was born in Leslie County in 1912 and completed the eighth grade. After he married, he worked at farming and logging and was able to support…
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  Fredericka Holdship, March 25,…

  Fredericka Holdship first came to the FNS as a courier in 1937 after having heard Mary Breckinridge speak at a meeting. She recalls her first trip to Wendover…
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  Helen E. Browne, March 26,…

  Helen "Brownie" Browne tells of her background in England and her nursing and midwifery training. She also discusses her midwifery experience before she came to…
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  Helen E. Browne, March 27,…

  Continuing from the previous interview, Helen Browne discusses Mary Breckinridge's political views and the background of some of her policy decisions. Browne…
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  Martha Prewitt Breckinridge,…

  Martha Breckinridge came to Wendover as it was being completed and served as secretary to Mary Breckinridge in addition to doing the cooking, making slip…
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  Sophia Howard, March 17, 1979

  Sophia Howard was born in 1895 on Muncy's Creek. She tells of the wildness of the county at that time and how people managed to live by weaving their own wool…
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  Robert Schaeffer, April 6,…

  Robert Schaeffer attended Red Bird High School, Berea College and Asbury Theological Seminary. At the time of the interview he was pastor for both…
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  William E. Hedges, April 18,…

  William Hedges was employed by the National Forest Service in the late 1920s and 1930s and operated out of a regional office with responsibility for eastern…
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  Annette Von Starch, April 17,…

  Annette Von Starch joined the Philadelphia Committee in the early 1950s. She remembers Mary Breckinridge as "an extremely forceful woman" and recalls the…
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  Elizabeth Gawthrop, Janet…

  Janet Hewes, Carrie Cheston, and Elizabeth Gawthrop are long-time members of the Philadelphia Committee. They comment upon their early interest in the FNS and…
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  Elizabeth Gawthrop, Edythe…

  Elizabeth Gawthrop, Edythe Balsley, and Mary Hodge discuss their membership on the Philadelphia Committee of the Frontier Nursing Service. The interviewees talk…
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  Elizabeth B. Boyd, April 10,…

  Elizabeth Boyd first became acquainted with the FNS and its Chicago Committee in the early 1930s. She recalls committee meetings in the Drake Hotel and cites…
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  Marianne Harper, April 9,…

  Marianne Harper became a courier for the FNS in the summer of 1933, following her graduation from the University of Chicago. She believes that the use of…
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  Carolyn Booth Gregory, March…

  Carolyn Gregory learned about the FNS while a student at Bates College in Maine. Following her graduation in the late 1940s, she volunteered to work as…
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  Alberta Kelly, April 26, 1979

  Alberta Kelly's mother and father both served on the FNS Board of Governors during the 1960s. She remembers several girlhood visits to Wendover, during which…
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  Kathleen Carter, April 26,…

  Kathleen Carter is a member of the Washington Committee of the FNS and the wife of former Congressman Tim Lee Carter. She discusses her husband's interest in…
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  Frances M. Carter, April 26,…

  Frances Carter was born in Louisville and in 1917 moved to Boston, where she later became involved in the Boston Committee of the Frontier Nursing Service. She…
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  Roger Egeberg, April 27, 1979

  Roger Egeberg was a young physician when he first heard Mary Breckinridge speak in Cleveland during the mid-1930s. After becoming Assistant Secretary for the…
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  Regina Blake, April 26, 1979

  Regina Blake learned of the FNS in the early 1960s through her friendship with Marvin Breckinridge Patterson. She began sending annual donations and joined the…
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  Virginia W. McKee, April 26,…

  Virginia McKee became involved in FNS publicity through Florence Wigglesworth, although she never visited Wendover. McKee recalls Mary Breckinridge in middle…
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  Mary Marvin Breckinridge…

  Mary Marvin Breckinridge Patterson (known most widely as Marvin Breckinridge or Marvin Breckinridge Patterson) recalls the visits of her cousin, Mary…
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  Edith Shaw, April 8, 1979

  Edith Shaw graduated from Moody Bible Institute in Chicago and came to Leslie County in 1936 to do missionary work. She tells of holding Sunday school in a…
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  Robert Montague, April 27,…

  Robert Montague's grandmother, Anne Wilson, was a first cousin of Mary Breckinridge and assisted her in establishing the FNS in Leslie County, Kentucky. …
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  Hazel Corbin, April 30, 1979

  Hazel Corbin visited Mary Breckinridge in Leslie County when the FNS was being organized, and Corbin describes conditions in the area in the 1920s. She was…
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  Phyllis Chisholm, Lillian…

  At the time of the interview Phyllis Chisholm was a director of nurse education in England, and Lillian Bartlett was an educational supervisor who visited…
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  Mallie Sizemore, February 18,…

  Mallie Sizemore was born in 1907 at Smilax in Leslie County and tells of her grandparents' experiences with Indian raids in the area. Sizemore also indicates…
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  Mary Huff Stidham, April 15,…

  Mary Stidham was born at Confluence in 1909. Because she was ill a great deal, she did not do the family chores that most children performed. Stidham tells of…
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  Lula Baker, April 29, 1979

  Lula Baker was born on Poll's Creek in Leslie County in 1912. Since the next child, a brother, was much younger, she helped her father work the farm, and she…
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  John R. Cornett, March 25,…

  John Cornett was born in Leslie County in 1900. He left high school after two terms to get married and then moved to Harlan County. Cornett farmed until about…
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  Johnny Baker, April 29, 1979

  Johnny Baker was a child at the time his older brother left for World War One. After completing the eighth grade, Baker began hauling staves and later worked…
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  Dora Fields, April 30, 1979

  Dora Fields was born in Perry County, Kentucky in 1907. She completed the fourth grade before beginning to do housework for neighboring families. Fields also…
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  Warren Maggard, March 25, 1979

  Warren Maggard grew up on Cutshin, where he completed the eighth grade. He then worked in coal mining jobs and did some farming. Maggard discusses social life…
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  Annie Witt, April 1, 1979

  Annie Witt was born in Perry County in 1914 and moved to Leslie County while still a child. She remembers various social activities and playing records on…
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  Pauline Lewis, April 20, 1979

  Pauline Lewis grew up on Baker Fork during the 1940s and later attended boarding school at Berea College's Foundation School. She recalls the establishment of…
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  Florence Burke, April 4, 1979

  Florence Burke grew up at Roark as the daughter of a farmer who was also a minister. She discusses social conditions, elections, and her military service during…
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  Elisha L. Creech, May 16, 1979

  Elisha Creech was born at Dryhill in 1900. He shares memories of his town in the early 1900s and the ways of living during that time. Creech talks about…
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  Walter Morgan, April 11, 1979

  Walter Morgan was born in Hyden in 1900. He describes Hyden in the early days, including various schools, stores, and grain mills. He also discusses early…
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  Ninnie Shepherd, April 5,…

  Ninnie Shepherd was born on Poll's Creek in 1907. After completing the sixth grade, she worked on the family farm and traveled to Hazard with her father to…
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  Mallie Witt, Bob Witt, April…

  Mallie Witt was born in 1911 on Poll's Creek at what is now Smilax. Bob Witt was born in 1915 and moved to Leslie County at the age of fifteen. They talk about…
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  Hosea Feltner, April 23, 1979

  Hosea Feltner was born at Flackey in 1906. As a child, she lived at Cutshin, Flackey, and eventually Hyden. After her marriage, she went back to school at Hyden…
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  John D. Muncy, May 15, 1979

  John Muncy taught school in one-room schoolhouses for eighteen years and served as local tax commissioner for twenty-one years. He discusses life in Leslie…
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  Billy Dixon, April 10, 1979

  Billy Dixon was born in 1903 and recounts his lifelong participation in politics in Leslie County until his retirement in 1975. His father served as sheriff for…
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  Vance Bowling, May 24, 1979

  Vance Bowling gives an overview of his early life in Leslie County. He discusses his time at school and the availability of books. He indicates that he left…
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  Ott Bowling, May 24, 1979

  Ott Bowling was born near Wendover in 1903 and gives an extended description of life in Leslie County when he was a child. After completing the eighth grade, he…
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  Rachel Bowling, Ott Bowling,…

  Rachel Bowling married Ott Bowling in 1925, and they raised ten children. They have lived in Leslie County almost all their lives. Rachel Bowling discusses her…
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  Laura Day Hogg, May 29, 1979

  Laura Hogg grew up in Leslie County during the 1920s and 1930s. Her father worked as a "truck patch peddler,"selling items produced on their farm. After…
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  James Parton, May 25, 1979

  James Parton has been a lifelong friend of Mary Breckinridge's first cousin once removed, Brooke Alexander. Alexander was an early FNS courier and persuaded…
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  Isabelle Lloyd, May 23, 1979

  A long-time member of the New York Committee, Isabel Lloyd first visited Wendover in 1947 when her daughter served as a courier. She recalls the trip over dirt…
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  Isabelle Lloyd, Dorothea…

  Dorothea Eberhart and Isabel Lloyd are members of the New York Committee. They discuss in detail the operation of the Bargain Box as a primary fund raising…
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  Phoebe Hawkins, Mary Martin,…

  Phoebe Hawkins and Mary Martin first met Mary Breckinridge in France in 1919 while working with the American Committee for Devastated France (C.A.R.D.). In the…
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  Brooke Alexander, September…

  Brooke Alexander's mother was Mary Breckinridge's first cousin. Born in 1912, Alexander spent his sixth winter with Mary Breckinridge and her son Breckie in…
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  Anne Winslow, September 25,…

  Anne Winslow was recruited by Marvin Breckinridge Patterson to operate an FNS office in New York City. Following her graduation from Vassar in 1930, Winslow…
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  Louis Hellman, November 29,…

  Dr. Louis Hellman pioneered the establishment of midwifery instruction at Kings County Hospital in New York. He advocated midwifery and also government aid for…
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  Mary Lansing, November 30,…

  Mary Breckinridge was a friend of Mary Lansing's mother and also her grandmother. Lansing's mother, Elizabeth Lansing, visited Wendover in 1946 to conduct…
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  Mary Wilson Neel, December 1,…

  Mary Neel became interested in the FNS through her mother's association with the Washington, D.C. Committee and through her friendship with Marvin Breckinridge…
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  Elizabeth Kalashnikoff, June…

  Elizabeth Kalashnikoff first met Mary Breckinridge while serving as Harper and Brothers editor for the publication of Wide Neighborhoods. She recalls…
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  Zaydee DeJonge Harris, June…

  Zaydee Harris was associated with the American Committee for Devastated France (C.A.R.D.) as a chauffeur. She tells of her experiences in signing up to go to…
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  John Rock, June 15, 1979

  Dr. John Rock became acquainted with Mary Breckinridge through his wife, who was with Breckinridge during her work with C.A.R.D. (American Committee for…
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  Mary Penton, June 15, 1979

  Mary Penton attended the Frontier Nursing Service (FNS) Graduate School of Midwifery from 1957 to 1958 after working for six months in general nursing. The FNS…
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  Caroline Standley, June 15,…

  Caroline Standley first learned about the Frontier Nursing Service in Louisville in the early 1960s and visited Hyden in 1974 with an English…
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  Mary Ann Quarles Hawkes, June…

  While in college, Mary Ann Hawkes worked in Leslie County with a group at the Stinnett Settlement School and began work for the FNS in 1948 in social services.…
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  Molly Lee, February 6, 1979

  Molly Lee was a district nurse at the Beech Fork Center in 1955. She talks about the various creek clinics set up by the FNS in addition to the regular centers…
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  Leonard Howard, July 9, 1979

  After returning from World War One, Leonard Howard operated a small hillside farm and then became a blacksmith for the Frontier Nursing Service. He shoed the…
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  Ruth Eichor, July 16, 1979

  Ruth Eichor was born in 1907 in Eureka Springs and left in 1929 for a period of forty years. She recalls the town being much larger when Mary Breckinridge lived…
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  Tim Lee Carter, July 21, 1979

  U.S. Congressman Tim Lee Carter became familiar with the FNS in 1937 during his medical career. At that time, possible funding for a new hospital was discussed…
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  Cecil Morgan, July 25, 1979

  Cecil Morgan was born on Camp Creek near Wendover in 1910 and has lived on the same farm all his life. At the age of ten Morgan helped his brother saw all the…
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  Emily Melton, Marie Melton,…

  Emily Melton was born at Wooton in 1883 and attended a one-room school until she was "about twenty-one." Her family was large, and her father farmed as well as…
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  Kenneth Warren, August 16,…

  Kenneth Warren studied tropical medicine in London, England with Dr. W.B. Beasley and later visited the FNS at Dr. Beasley's invitation. He made rounds with…
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  Florence McLaughlin, Mary…

  Florence McLaughlin was born in 1904 and lived in Eureka Springs at the time Mary Breckinridge was living there with her husband, Richard Thompson. McLaughlin…
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  Carrie M. Parker, September…

  Carrie Parker's mother was born in Leslie County in 1900 and went to nursing school in Philadelphia. She returned to Leslie County as a public health nurse…
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  Sarah Hall, October 12, 1979

  Sarah Hall recalls her great grandfather's stories of life during the Civil War and tales of her grandmother, a Native American who ran away from her family…
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  Jerry Weston, April 23, 1980

  Jerry Weston has a nursing degree, a master's degree in public health, and a doctorate in health services research. Her first connection with the FNS was as a…
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  Julie Breckinridge Davis,…

  Julie Davis, a great-niece of Mary Breckinridge, visited her aunt periodically at Wendover. At the age of ten she became a junior courier and helped with the…
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  Elizabeth Lansing, June 6,…

  Elizabeth Lansing's mother was acquainted with Mary Breckinridge's brother, and Lansing recalls the visits of Mary Breckinridge when she was young. With the…
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  Agnes Lewis, January 5, 1978

  Mary Breckinridge hired Agnes Lewis in 1930, when Lewis was about thirty, to work in the FNS records department. Lewis describes an eventful trip to Wendover,…
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  Mary Wiss, February 14, 1979

  Mary Wiss came to the FNS as medical director in 1965 after having been a Sister of Charity in India and remained with the FNS until 1969. She indicates some of…
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  Pauline Fox, Mary Wiss,…

  Doctors Mary Wiss and Pauline Fox came to the FNS in 1965. As a regional and local health officer for the previous seven years, Fox was acquainted with Mary…
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  Jolene Power, August 11, 1979

  Jolene Power was born in 1943 at Hyden Hospital in Kentucky. Jolene explains what life was like growing up in Saltwell, Kentucky. Specifically, family…
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  Bill Hendrix, September 30,…

  Bill Hendrix was born in Wooton in 1912. He talks about his one-room school and activities at home on the farm. When he left school, Hendrix went to work in the…
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  Kate Ireland, November 1,…

  Kate Ireland first came to the FNS in 1951 as a junior courier. Her sister, her mother, and her great-aunt had been associated with the FNS before her, and her…
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  Sherman Wooten, November 7,…

  Sherman Wooten was born on Cutshin Creek in 1910 and grew up in Leslie County with the exception of two years in Ohio. He remembers stories about Confederate…
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  Margaret Gage, November 29,…

  In this interview with Margaret Gage, a close friend of Mary Breckinridge, she relates how she and Breckinridge met, and talks about their friendship through…
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  Wilma Duvall Whittlesey,…

  Wilma Whittlesey first read of the FNS in the rotogravure section of the Louisville Courier-Journal in 1929. She answered a secretarial ad and became Mary…
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  Betty Lester, July 27, 1978

  Betty Lester discusses her midwifery training in England in the 1920s and describes her journey from London to FNS headquarters at Wendover. She explains in…
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  Betty Lester, August 3, 1978

  Betty Lester continues from the previous interview a discussion of the making of the film "The Forgotten Frontier." She comments upon the participation of local…
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  Tempie Young, September 6,…

  Tempie Young continues from a previous interview her discussion of life in a coal camp. Because of the infrequency of mine accidents in the early 1920s, she was…
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  Lydia Thompson,

  Lydia Thompson was associated with the FNS as a nurse-midwife from 1947 to 1952. She describes Mary Breckinridge, who started the FNS, and her attitude toward…
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  Elizabeth M. Bear, December…

  Elizabeth Bear was recruited for the FNS in 1971 by Trudy Isaacs in conjunction with an effort to establish a link between the FNS and the University of…
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  Roy Sizemore, September 1,…

  Roy Sizemore was born at Dryhill in Leslie County, Kentucky. He gives some information about his grandfather, who was a Union soldier in the Civil War, and also…
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  Lucille Knechtly, July 9,…

  Lucille Knechtley joined the FNS during World War Two as a secretary. She became secretary to Mary Breckinridge and remained with the FNS for fourteen years. …
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  Ollie Baker, November 25, 1979

  Ollie Baker was born in 1906 at Big Rock in Leslie County, where she attended a one-room school and completed the eighth grade. As a child, Baker helped with…
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  Nora Colwell, December 2,…

  Nora Colwell was born in Leslie County in 1908 and began school at about the age of nine. She indicates that when the flu epidemic hit Leslie County in 1918…
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  Herbert Colwell, December 2,…

  Herbert Colwell was born in Perry County in 1905 and lived for a time on Grassy Branch in Leslie County. At the age of sixteen or seventeen, he went to work in…
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  June Wells, December 26, 1979

  June Wells grew up in Leslie County and, after attending her father's one-room school, went on to complete high school. She remembers the building of the FNS…
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  Henry Lewis, January 6, 1980

  Henry Lewis was born at Cowhead in Leslie County in 1905 and attended school through the third grade before leaving to work on the family farm. In 1918 he…
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  Fannie Huff, March 16, 1980

  Fannie Huff was born at Dryhill in 1911. She describes her childhood, when her father farmed and logged for a living. Huff also tells of her later life in the…
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  James Young, January 27, 1980

  James Young was born on Wooton's Creek in Leslie County in 1907. After attending Wooton School through the ninth grade, he began his life work as a coal miner.…
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  Laura Begley, June 1, 1980

  Laura Begley was born at Wooton and attended her one-room school through the sixth grade, at which point she left school to take care of her mother, who was…
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  Don Sparkman, June 1, 1980

  Don Sparkman was born in Hyden in 1907. His father taught school, became sheriff, and then worked in the coal mines. Sparkman recalls Hyden before Prohibition,…
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  Myrtle Morgan, May 14, 1980

  Myrtle Morgan was born in 1890 in a two-story log house on her father's farm, near Hyden. As a child, Morgan went to Hyden Academy, and she recalls seeing that…
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  Minnie Stidham, May 5, 1980

  Minnie Stidham was born in Leslie County at Daley in 1910. Her family took produce from their farm twelve miles on horseback to sell in the mining camps in…
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  Edith Collett, April 20, 1980

  Edith Collett grew up in Leslie County on Rockhouse Creek where her father worked in a sawmill. She indicates that FNS nurses delivered all of her children,…
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  Mary Pennington, April 15,…

  Mary Pennington, one of eleven children, was born in Laurel County in 1904. Her family came to Leslie County in 1908 to join her brothers already living there.…
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  Elisha Shepherd, June 8, 1980

  Elisha Shepherd was born in Hazard, Kentucky in 1919 and moved to Leslie County in 1931. He talks about the difficulty of providing such things as shoes in a…
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  Diane Wilson, July 22, 1980

  Diane Wilson discusses the involvement of the FNS in home health work. Beginning in 1966, a nurse was stationed at each FNS outpost center specifically to take…
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  Mary Stewart, January 15, 1980

  Throughout the course of Mary Stewart's childhood, she learned about the Frontier Nursing Service. Her grandmother, Anna Richardson, was a close friend to the…
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  Janet Dete, January 16, 1980

  In this brief interview, Janet Dete discusses her experience with the Frontier Nursing Service. She talks about meetings with the service, her position within…
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  Treon Christine, January 19,…

  Treon Christine served as a courier at Wendover for six weeks in the mid-1950s. She indicates that she was actively discouraged from dating men in the Hyden or…
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  Thruston Ballard Morton, Sr.,…

  Thruston Morton's grandmother, Sunshine Harris Ballard, was very interested in the FNS and knew Mary Breckinridge. His grandparents contributed funds to help…
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  Nellie Asher, August 27, 1980

  The FNS delivered Nellie Asher's first child in 1925. She asserts that in the beginning the local people would not use the nurses because of a rumor that they…
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  Beth Burchenal Jones,

  Beth Jones became acquainted with the FNS through her aunt, Margaret Rogan, who was a friend of Mary Breckinridge, and her cousin, who was an early courier.…
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  Nancy Dammann,

  Nancy Damman first came to the FNS in 1941 as a courier after college and eventually returned to settle in Leslie County. She compares the couriers in her group…
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  Ada Combs, [n.d.]

  Ada Combs was born in 1905 and grew up on Bear Branch of Poll's Creek in Leslie County. She tells about her windowless one-room school and of wading through the…
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  Elizabeth Finley, Paul Finley,…

  Paul Finley was born in Clay County in 1925. He had very few toys as a child and cherished the little sailor toy out of a box of Crackerjack bought for him by…
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  Bertha Howard, July 26, 1979

  Bertha Howard was born in 1901 and came to Kentucky in 1916. She then attended Pine Mountain Settlement School where students worked for their board and…
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  Godfrey Shell, Stella Shell,…

  Godfrey Shell and Stella Shell talk about their school and life in the county when they were young, including home remedies for a number of issues. Both talk…
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  Opha Shell, August 26, 1979

  Opha Shell recalls the FNS nurses having delivered two of her brothers and sisters at home. The last child was delivered at the hospital for a fee of seven…
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  Stella Shell, August 26, 1979

  Stella Shell was born at Whiteoak in Leslie County in 1903. She walked three and a half miles to her one-room log school where the students sat on hewed planks.…
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  Rufus Shepherd,

  Rufus Shepherd describes his life in the mountains when he was young. He refers to the practices of a number of local churches and characterizes weddings and…
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  Juder Stidham, June 3, 1979

  Juder Stidham was born in Leslie County in 1909. He attended Hyden Grade School, Leslie County High School, Lees Junior College and Union College. When he was…
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  Jarvis Taylor, July 22, 1979

  Jarvis Taylor was born in Bell County in 1909, and his family moved to Phillips' Fork in Leslie County in 1927. According to Taylor, times were hard when he was…
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  Edna Rockstroh, September 22,…

  Edna Rockstroh first met Mary Breckinridge during the relief effort in France after World War One. During her midwifery training in London she was informed of…
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  Primrose Bowling, December 10,…

  Primrose Bowling was born in England in 1928. In 1952 she came to the FNS as a registered nurse-midwife to instruct nurses in midwifery. Bowling describes Hyden…
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  Jean Corner, Ann Lorentzen,…

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  Betty Hillman, April 5, 2005

  In this interview Betty Hillman discusses her background and introduction to nursing, and her time spent with the Frontier Nursing Service. Hillman goes into…
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  Molly Lee, April 5, 2005

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  Maggie Wilson, April 9, 2005

  Maggie Wilson describes her experiences working for the Frontier Nursing Service. Wilson talks about the differences between her home city of London, England…
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  Roberta Stidham, May 17, 2006

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  Judy Rafson, May 12, 2006

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  Angela Mitchell, May 29, 2006

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  Angela Mitchell, February 24,…

  Angela Mitchell discusses her work with the Frontier Nursing Service. She goes into detail about the administration of the FNS, how work relationships she's…
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  Mary Marvin Breckinridge…

  This is a presentation given by Mary Marvin Breckinridge Patterson (known most widely as Marvin Breckinridge or Marvin Breckinridge Patterson) as part of the…
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  Betty Lester, July 15, 1970

  In this interview with Betty Lester she discusses her decision to come to the Frontier Nursing Service after her midwifery training in England, and talks about…
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  Jean Fee, June 15, 2002

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  Marilyn Osborne, July 22, 2002

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  Wanda Morgan, July 7, 2002

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  Gertrude Morgan, July 27, 2002

  Gertrude Morgan was a nurse with the Frontier Nursing Service. In this interview she discusses how she learned of the FNS and why she decided to attend their…
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  Clara Jefferis, July 27, 2002

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  Beulah Arnold, August 2, 2002

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  Gertrude C. Bluemel, August…

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  Agnes Lewis, July 15, 1970

  Agnes Lewis talks about coming to work for the Frontier Nursing Service in 1931 as the head of the records department. She stayed in that position for one year…
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  Anna May January, July 15,…

  Anna May January talks about her arrival at the Frontier Nursing Service, her first impressions, and male and female patients being kept together in the…
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  Silas Dwane House, September…

  Kentucky author Silas House reflects on the impact the Frontier Nursing Service and midwife Betty Lester had--and still has--on his family. He also discusses…