The Project Gutenberg EBook of Clara Barton National Historic Site, Maryland, by Anonymous This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. Title: Clara Barton National Historic Site, Maryland Handbook 110 Author: Anonymous Release Date: July 8, 2016 [EBook #52524] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CLARA BARTON HISTORIC SITE *** Produced by Stephen Hutcheson, Dave Morgan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net 003 Clara Barton National Historic Site, Maryland Handbook 110 Clara Barton Clara Barton National Historic Site Maryland Produced by the Division of Publications National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior Washington, D.C. 1981 The National Park Handbook Series National Park Handbooks, compact introductions to the great natural and historic places administered by the National Park Service, are designed to promote understanding and enjoyment of the parks. Each is intended to be informative reading and a useful guide before, during, and after a park visit. More than 100 titles are in print. This is Handbook 110. You may purchase the handbooks through the mail by writing to the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. 20402. Part 1 Clara Barton and Her Times A Look to the Past A Chronology Part 2 The Professional Angel Square as a Brick Doing Something Decided Battling for Ratification Barton and the Red Cross in Action Storm and Controversy Part 3 Guide and Adviser Clara Barton National Historic Site: A Saga of Preservation National Park Service Sites Associated with Clara Barton National Park Service Sites Commemorating American Women Related Sites Armchair Explorations: Some Books You May Want to Read Index 4 About This Book Clara Barton National Historic Site in Glen Echo, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C., memorializes the life of Clara Barton, the founder of the American Red Cross. Part 1 of this book is a chronology of Clara Barton and her times. Part 2 is a biographical essay. Part 3 is a guide to the park itself and to National Park Service and other public and private areas associated with her career. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data United States, National Park Service. Clara Barton, Clara Barton National Historic Site, Maryland. (National park handbook; 110) Includes index. CONTENTS: Clara Barton and her times—Pryor, E.B. The professional angel Guide and adviser. 1. Barton, Clara Harlowe, 1821-1912. 2. Clara Barton National Historic Site, Md. I. Title. II. Series: United States. National Park Service. Handbook-National Park Service: 110 HV569.B3U65 1981 361.7′63[B] 80-607838 Contents 4 6 8 14 by Elizabeth Brown Pryor 16 22 35 46 56 66 68 72 75 76 78 79 Clara Barton and Her Times 7 6 The figures are, from left to right: Grand Duchess Louise of Baden, Antoinette Margot, George Kennan, Julian Hubbell, Clara Barton, and Jean-Henri Dunant. A Look at the Past Clara Barton, humanitarian and founder of the American Red Cross, spent the last 15 years of her life in a house in Glen Echo, Maryland, now known as Clara Barton National Historic Site. Here her contributions to American life and her personal achievements are memorialized. Here you can see many of her personal effects and some of the awards given to her. Here, too, you can learn of the substance of her life and see how she lived and worked. From Glen Echo, you can go on to several other National Park System sites associated with Clara Barton: Antietam, Andersonville, Manassas, Fredericksburg, and Johnstown. Together these diverse sites document her life, her work, and her legacy. Begin here at her house and fill in details of her life as you come across them at the other sites. For example, the lumber you see in the building at Glen Echo was originally used as temporary housing for victims of the Johnstown, Pennsylvania, flood in 1889. After Clara Barton and the Red Cross finished helping the injured and the homeless in that city, the structure was dismantled and shipped to Washington, D.C. Two years later, the materials were used at Glen Echo to construct a national headquarters for the American Red Cross. The new building had essentially the same lines as the Johnstown structure with various alterations to accommodate the needs of the American Red Cross and Clara Barton herself. Initially she planned to use this building as a warehouse for American Red Cross supplies. Six years after its construction, the building was remodeled and used not only as a warehouse, but also as the headquarters of the new organization and as the residence for her and her staff. The structure served all purposes well. Clara Barton did not distinguish between herself and the organization she founded. The lines were blurred; she was the Red Cross, and the Red Cross was Clara Barton. That is evident here in the house, for she did not separate living space from working space. The building’s purposes merged in its principal resident. Using the place as a home, Clara Barton learned to love the passage of the seasons, to enjoy the way the light came in at different times of the year, to plant the yard and garden the way she wanted. As a headquarters and warehouse for the Red Cross, the building served her well, too. She met there with many dignitaries and volunteers on Red Cross business and stored supplies for potential disasters. Her home and office testify to her complete and unequivocal devotion to the Red Cross. Less sharply focused is Clara Barton’s role in women’s rights. Miss Barton was neither a traditional woman nor a radical feminist, although Susan B. Anthony and Harriet Austin were friends. She did not repudiate the traditional roles for women. Instead she succeeded in enlarging that accepted sphere so that the traditional skills of women—teaching children, nursing the sick—became acceptable in the public 8 sphere. Clara Barton argued for women’s equality and believed in their right to vote. But concern for her fledgling organization overrode her dedication to women’s rights and all other causes. At her home and office in Glen Echo you can begin to sense this complex, fascinating individual: the public and private person so inextricably intertwined. You sense the space in which Clara Barton moved, worked, and thought. Impressions coalesce into an image. And yet that image cannot become distinct without understanding her many ideas, desires, and efforts noted in her diaries, letters, and papers. This handbook tells the story of her eventful 90 years. The next few pages contain a brief chronology of her life and times. Part 2 provides a full-length biographical essay by historian Elizabeth Brown Pryor. Barton in both triumph and defeat is here for the reader to accept, reject, or wonder at. Many of her own words are here to explain more fully what she was thinking—and worrying—about. The biography amplifies the chronology, making it come alive with the whims and inconsistencies of human nature. It’s a book within a book. And Part 3 is a guide to sites, managed by the National Park Service and other public and private organizations, associated with Clara Barton and her career. Together the three parts of this handbook provide a clear image of one of the most outstanding women of the 19th century, Clara Barton. A Chronology 1821 Clara Barton is born December 25 in North Oxford, Massachusetts 1825 John Quincy Adams becomes President; Erie Canal opens 1829 Andrew Jackson becomes President 1830 U.S. population is 12,866,020; Peter Cooper builds first U.S. locomotive 1832 Clara Barton nurses brother David back to health; Louisa May Alcott is born Louisa May Alcott 1834 Cyrus McCormick patents reaper 1835 Sarah and Angelina Grimké become active abolitionists; Samuel Colt patents revolver Sarah Grimké Angelina Grimké 1837 Martin Van Buren becomes President 9 1839 Clara Barton begins teaching school in North Oxford and continues teaching for the next 11 years; Mount Holyoke, first college for women, opens Clara Barton as a schoolteacher 1841 William Henry Harrison becomes President, dies April 4 and is succeeded by John Tyler 1842 Use of anesthetics begins in U.S. 1844 First telegraphic message sent by S.F.B. Morse 1845 James K. Polk becomes President; Margaret Fuller publishes Woman in the Nineteenth Century; Frederick Douglass publishes Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave 1846 Mexican War begins, ends in 1848 1847 American Medical Association is founded 1848 First Women’s Rights Convention is held in Seneca Falls, New York 1849 Zachary Taylor becomes President, dies July 9, 1850, and is succeeded by Millard Fillmore; Elizabeth Blackwell becomes first woman to receive M.D. degree 1850 Clara Barton plans to enter Clinton Liberal Institute, Clinton, New York; Harriet Tubman begins helping slaves escape via Underground Railway Harriet Tubman 1851 Clara Barton’s mother dies 1852 Clara Barton starts free school at Bordentown, New Jersey; Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin is published Harriet Beecher Stowe 1853 Franklin Pierce becomes President; Singer sewing machine factory opens 1854 Clara Barton moves to Washington, D.C., and becomes clerk in Patent Office—at that time the only female employed by U.S. Government 1857 Battle of Solferino is fought June 24; James Buchanan becomes President 1859 Edwin Drake drills first oil well 1860 U.S. population is 31,443,321 (includes 3,953,760 slaves and 448,800 free blacks) 1861 Clara Barton begins aid to Union soldiers; Abraham Lincoln becomes President, is assassinated April 15, 1865, and is succeeded by Andrew Johnson; American Civil War begins with firing on Fort Sumter, South Carolina, and ends 1865 at Appomattox Court House, Virginia Union soldiers near Falmouth, Virginia 10 Abraham Lincoln 1862 Clara Barton’s father dies; Un Souvenir de Solferino is published by Jean-Henri Dunant 1864 Clara Barton becomes supervisor of nurses for the Army of the James; Treaty of Geneva is signed, thereby establishing the International Red Cross 1865 Clara Barton works at Andersonville, Georgia, to establish national cemetery 1867 U.S. purchases Alaska; first practical typewriter is developed by Christopher Sholes 1868 Andrew Johnson is acquitted in impeachment proceedings; Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton begin publication of The Revolution Susan B. Anthony Elizabeth Cady Stanton 1869 Clara Barton begins travels in Europe that last until 1873, and meets Dr. Louis Appia of the International Committee of the Red Cross; U.S. Secretary of State Hamilton Fish rejects Treaty of Geneva; Ulysses S. Grant becomes President; first state board of health is established in Massachusetts 1870 Clara Barton works with Red Cross during Franco-Prussian War, which lasts until 1871 Grand Duchess Louise of Baden 1872 Victoria Woodhull becomes first woman to run for U.S. President 1873 First school of nursing is established at Bellevue Hospital in New York City 1874 Clara Barton meets Julian Hubbell in Dansville, New York; Frances Willard founds Women’s Christian Temperance Union; electric streetcars begin running in New York City 11 Julian Hubbell 1876 Clara Barton collaborates with Susan B. Anthony on biographies of noted women; Alexander Graham Bell invents telephone 1877 Clara Barton begins correspondence with Louis Appia with goal of having U.S. ratify Treaty of Geneva; Rutherford B. Hayes becomes President Rutherford B. Hayes 1879 Edison invents incandescent light bulb