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Simmons College Archives

The Women of Simmons College, 1900 - 1920

The Alumnae

Simmons College graduated its first class of 32 students in 1906. These pioneering women and future alumnae pursued notable careers and active lives, applying the education obtained at Simmons to better themselves and the communities in which they lived and worked. Many went on to hold respected and significant positions in the fields of public health nursing, household economics, librarianship, and social work; others became doctors, writers, politicians, and public servants.

Common among the experiences of all alumnae of Simmons College is the remarkable range of personal and professional activities aspired to and achieved after graduation. These accomplished women often attributed their successes to both the strong and practical educational foundation Simmons College provided and the encouragement of successful and mentoring faculty. For many graduates, a Simmons education led to challenging, successful careers, and the self-respect that came from earning an “independent livelihood.”

 

Dorothy Boulding Ferebee’20 , 1890-1980, was a tireless advocate for racial equality and women's health care. After graduating from English High School with highest honors, Ferebee attended Simmons College in Secretarial Studies. Following her lifelong dream, she applied to medical school and was accepted into Tufts University School of Medicine. She moved to Washington, D.C., for an internship at Freedmen's Hospital. In 1925, in a derelict section of Capitol Hill, she established Southeast Neighborhood House to provide health care for impoverished African Americans. She also set up the Southeast Neighborhood Society, which offered a playground and day care for children of working mothers. She was founding president of the Women's Institute, an organization that served educational, community, government, and non-profit organizations, as well as individual patients.

During the Depression, Ferebee was appointed medical director of the Mississippi Health Project, designed to serve the needs of the impoverished rural black population. From 1935-1942 mobile medical units traveled throughout Mississippi for two-to-six weeks ever summer. The project promoted immunization programs for smallpox and diphtheria and tackled malnutrition and venereal disease.

From 1949-1968, Ferebee was director of Howard University Medical School's health services. An active member of the National Council of Negro Women, she served as its second president from 1949 to 1953, and expanded the organization's efforts to eliminate discrimination against minorities in housing, health care, education, and the armed forces.

In the early 1960s, President John F. Kennedy appointed her to the Council for Food for Peace, for which she traveled through Africa for five months, lecturing on preventive medicine. In 1959, Ferebee received the first Alumnae Achievement Award from Simmons College in recognition of her years of leadership in the field of health care.

 

Susan Sadow’17 , made a career of combating poverty. After graduating from the School of Household Economics at Simmons College, she became Director of Home Economics and dietetics for the Federated Jewish Charities of Boston, and three years later moved to the United Hebrew Charities of New York City. In 1926 she went to Palestine to conduct a dietetic survey on behalf of Hadassah Medical Organization.

From 1932-1943 she served as chief nutritionist with the New York City Department of Welfare, when she was recruited by the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Agency. Sadow was sent to North Africa to organize and administer feeding programs in refugee camps; she then went to Italy where she often spent 12-hour days traveling by jeep to remote, bombed-out areas of the country. Exhausted by the war, Sadow retired from nutrition and began working as an interior decorator and traveling the world. When she returned to the United States in 1957, she organized her experiences into a lecture series entitled “Getting to Know People Around the World.” In 1961 she joined the Peace Corps, and spent two years teaching in Sierra Leone, after which she became Senior Nutrition Specialist of the National Head Start Program. In 1968, she received the Simmons Alumnae Achievement Award for her persistent altruistic concern for the welfare of people of other nations.

 

Gertrude Barbour Thomas ’10 , 1889-1980, teacher, nurse, and missionary, received her undergraduate degree in Household Economics from Simmons College in 1910. A year later she became the first person to receive a graduate degree from Simmons when she was awarded an M.S. in biology. Her thesis was entitled "Regional Activity in Skeletal Muscle" and was acclaimed by her advisor, Percy G. Stiles, to be "a real landmark in neuromuscular physiology."

Thomas served for four years as an Assistant in the Department of Biology and then left to enter the Nurses' Training School at Johns Hopkins Hospital. She married Harold Thomas, M.D., in 1918 and a year later moved to Ningpo, China where Dr. Thomas served as a medical missionary for the American Baptist Foreign Missionary Society at the Hwa Mei Hospital. Thomas and her family were interned by the Japanese at the outbreak of WWII and returned to the U.S. in 1943. The family returned to Ningpo from 1947-1950 when the Communist take-over again forced their return to the United States.

 

Bertha Mahony Miller’06 , 1882-1969, attended Simmons College in 1905-1906 in the department of secretarial studies. After leaving Simmons she was hired by the Women’s Educatinal and Industrial Union, and four years later was placed in charge of the Children’s Players, a children’s theater group sponsored by the WEIU. In 1915 Miller persuaded the WEIU to open a children’s bookshop with her heading the department; The Bookshop for Boys and Girls opened in October 1916, devoted to the recommendation, promotion, and sale of children’s books.

Shortly thereafter, the bookshop published its first buying guide, Books for Boys and Girls: A Suggested Purchase List. Eight years later Miller and her partner Elinor Whitney Field cofounded The Horn Book as a magazine for the study of children’s literature, with an audience of parents, librarians, educators, authors, illustrators, and publishers. In 1934 Miller withdrew from the Bookshop to devote her time to The Horn Book. In 1936 she and Field and their husbands formed the Horn Book, Inc. and ended their connection with the WEIU. Over the years the magazine grew from an eighteen page quarterly consisting mostly of books recommended by Miller and Field to a bi-monthly of nearly 100 pages including articles about writers and illustrators and numerous critical reviews. In addition to the magazine, the company published titles on children’s books. Miller remained editor of The HornBook until 1950, when she retired to become President of The Horn Book, Inc.; she retired from the presidency and role of chairman of the board in 1962, the recipient of many honors and award for her contributions to children’s literature.

 

Louise Randall Pierson ’10 , 1890- ?, graduated from the Simmons College School of Secretarial Studies in 1910, worked as a secretary before marriage, and later wrote articles for several New York bankers’ magazines. Through two marriages, four children, and a series of economic challenges including bankruptcies and the Great Depression, Pierson maintained a positive attitude which she revealed in her 1943 autobiography, Roughly Speaking.

In 1945, Roughly Speaking became a Warner Brothers’ movie starring Rosalind Russell as Louise Pierson, and Jack Carson as her husband.

 

Geneva Daland ‘18 , 1896-?, graduated from Simmons College with a degree from the School of Household Economics. Like many in her program, Daland’s focus was science, and after graduation she worked for the Cancer Commission of Harvard University and Boston’s Huntington Hospital. She taught at Northeastern University for six months and later taught hematology at New England Deaconess Hospital for two years. In 1928, she joined the Thorndike Memorial Laboratory at Boston City Hospital, a pioneer in hospital-based clinical research. As a technologist in the field of hematology, Daland worked on blood diseases, and taught students from Harvard Medical School, as well as residents and fellows. Daland authored the Atlas of Morphologic Hematology in 1951, as well as many reports, studies, and articles. In 1961 she retired and, in 1964, received a special citation from Boston City Hospital for distinguished achievement in medicine.

 

Louise Andrews Kent ’09 , 1886-1969, author of children’s books and cookbooks, graduated from the Simmons School of Library Science where she was President of her senior class and editor of the Grindstone, the precursor to Microcosm. She began writing professionally for the Boston Traveler under the name Theresa Tempest, where her column was known as “Theresa’s Tea Table.” 1931 saw the publication of her first children’s book, Douglas of Porcupine. Over the years, while dividing her time between Boston and Vermont, Kent wrote many books for children, and a number of cookbooks starring Mrs. Appleyard, a protagonist whose life appeared to have a great deal in common with that of Louise Andrews Kent!

 

Irene Weed Landers ’13 graduated from the Simmons College School of Household Economics, and moved to New Hampshire where she became involved in community affairs. She was on the faculties of Pinkerton Academy and Keene Normal School, contributed to House Beautiful, and served on numerous local community committees. She became the State Senator from the Tenth District to the New Hampshire Senate, where she sponsored bills reforming primary election laws, and restricting appointive state offices to two terms.

 

Frances Keegan Marquis ’16 , 189?-1984, graduated from the School of Secretarial Studies at Simmons College and began working at the University of Illinois. During the Depression she became Assistant Director and then Executive Director of Programs for the American Women’s Association, a position she held until 1942. She then joined the Women’s Army Corps, and became a captain before receiving orders to head the first WAC unit to go overseas in World War II. She led a unit of 204 women, arriving in North Africa on January 29, 1943, assigned to General Dwight D. Eisenhower’s headquarters in Algiers. Marquis returned to the United States in 1944 to attend the Command and General Staff School. After the war she devoted her time to voluntary work including assignments for the United Nations.

 

Anne Williams Wheaton ’12 became the first woman to hold the position of Associate Press Secretary at the White House. A graduate of the Simmons College School of Secretarial Studies, she pursued a career as a journalist beginning with a job copying recipes for the Albany Knickerbocker Press. In 1924 she moved to Washington, D.C. and entered public relations work. For six years she was Director of the League of Women Voters, originating the annual survey of women in public office. From 1939-1953, she was Director of Women’s Publicity of the Republican National Committee until her appointment as Associate Press Secretary in 1953.

 

Abbie Dunks ’18 , a graduate of the Simmons College School of Secretarial Studies, began working for the Boston Dispensary not long after graduation, and became the first woman appointed Director in 1950. The Dispensary, founded in 1801, was committed to providing treatment for the sick outside of the hospital, and supported the formation of the Visiting Doctors Association in 1837, and the Instructive District Nursing Association in 1886, as well as social work programs and a Health Clinic. During Dunks’ years as Director, the Dispensary opened the first Rehabilitation Institute in Massachusetts. In addition to public speaking, and writing for hospital journals, Dunks was also the first woman President of the Massachusetts Hospital Association.

 

Back to The Women of Simmons College, 1900-1920

Learn about members of the early Faculty of Simmons College

Learn about the early Corporation members of Simmons College

 

 

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Page updated: July 8, 2008

 

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