| | LEVEL OF DESCRIPTION: | Fonds | | No.: | PR1838 | | TITLE: | Victorian Order of Nurses (Edmonton Branch) fonds | | CREATOR: | Victorian Order of Nurses (Edmonton Branch) | | DATE RANGE: | 1913-1989 | | EXTENT: | 0.56 m of textual records and other material
Includes 8 scrapbooks, 38 photographs, 3 negatives and 1 transparency. | | ADMINISTRATIVE | | HISTORY/BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH: | In response to accounts of the hardship and illness affecting women and children in isolated areas of the country, the Victorian Order of Home Helpers was established on February 10, 1897 after being proposed by Lady Ishbel Aberdeen, wife of the Governor General; the Order commemorated Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee. By March of 1897, the name of the group had become the Victorian Order of Nurses for Canada. Queen Victoria granted the organization its royal charter in December 1897. Under the guidance of Charlotte McLeod, the first Chief Lady Superintendent, the Order’s objectives, outlined in the royal charter, were to supply nurses thoroughly trained in hospital and public health nursing and subject to one central authority, for the nursing of the sick, the prevention of disease, and the promotion of health. Victorian Order nurses first came to western Canada in 1898 during the Klondike Gold Rush, dispatched with a detachment of North-West Mounted Police to provide nursing care to men going to and in Dawson, Yukon Territory and Bonanza Creek, British Columbia. The first Victorian Order of Nurses branches were organized in Ottawa, Ontario, Montreal, Quebec, Toronto, Ontario, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Vancouver, British Columbia and Kingston, Ontario. In 1898, the first Victorian Order of Nurses “cottage hospital” was opened in Regina, North-West Territories, to provide care to pioneers and early settlers on the prairies. Through the fundraising efforts of the second honorary president, Lady Mary Caroline Minto, wife of the Governor General, more hospitals were established in local communities and isolated areas of Canada.
The Victorian Order of Nurses was established in Edmonton, Alberta in 1909, with Mrs. Robert Kneil as the first president. The association first used the name Victorian Order District Nurse Association, Edmonton, and was subject to the by-laws and regulations of the Victorian Order of Nurses for Canada. The main objective of the Association was to provide skilled nursing to the sick, who were otherwise unable to obtain trained nursing in their own homes, with the limits of the city. A Board of Management was responsible for the control and management of the Association and consisted of an honourary president, a president, vice-presidents and thirty members elected at the annual general meeting. By 1930, those in Edmonton went by the name Victorian Order of Nurses, Edmonton Branch. The Victorian Order of Nurses (Edmonton Branch) was officially incorporated October 27, 1954 under the Societies Act, with the objective of carrying on in Edmonton and vicinity, nursing services as previously carried on by the Edmonton Branch of the Victorian Order of Nurses of Canada. | | SCOPE AND CONTENT: | The fonds consists of the Victorian Order of Nurses (Edmonton Branch) and includes minutes, booklets of rules and regulations, reports, including reports for the Florence Nightingale Emergency Auxiliary who were working for the Victorian Order of Nurses, correspondence, monthly and annual reports, financial statements, newspaper clippings, material relating to the Provincial Branch, the book Victorian Order of Nurses for Canada, Fiftieth Anniversary, 1897-1947, Victorian Order of Nurses for Canada nursing manuals, scrapbooks of newspaper clippings and photographs, and images of nurses. | | ASSOCIATED MATERIAL: | Also see the Victorian Order of Nurses (Calgary) fonds at the Glenbow Archives in Calgary, Alberta. As well, see the Victorian Order of Nurses for Canada fonds at Library and Archives Canada in Ottawa, Ontario. | | RELATED RECORDS: | Also see the Victorian Order of Nurses (Province of Alberta) fonds. | | GENERAL NOTE: | Information for the administrative history is taken from the Alberta Gazette, from the Victorian Order of Nurses for Canada website, http://www.von.ca/about_history.html, from the Victorian Order of Nurses (Edmonton) website, http://www.vonedmonton.ab.ca/aboutus.htm, both accessed June 20, 2006 and from the records. |
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