Jane Addams

One of the most controversial women of the twentieth century, Jane Addams advocated for children, women, immigrants, fair working conditions, and world peace at a time when women were told to keep quiet and stay at home. Her efforts led to the founding of the first school of social work and of Hull-House, the best-known community house in the United States.

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As part of our Biographies for Young Readers series for middle-grade readers, this book explains who Jane Addams was and why she caused such a stir in the United States and worldwide. The story follows Addams from her first realization of the unfairness that limited the lives, livelihoods, and health of disadvantaged people in the late 1800s to her becoming one of the most beloved—and most disliked—women of her day. She worked to create a more peaceful, fair world for all people, no matter their race, color, nationality, or gender.

Along her journey, Addams cofounded Hull-House, the most celebrated settlement house in the United States, and she became a motivating author, speaker, and women’s rights and peace advocate. She worked tirelessly on community, state, and national levels to promote women’s, workers’, and children’s rights, and she spoke passionately against the evils of war. Addams devoted her activities and writings to championing programs for these and other humanitarian causes. Votes for women! Equal rights for African Americans! Good schools and a healthy environment for children! No one—not millionaires, presidents, or the FBI—could stand in the way of her quest for justice.

Addams became one of few women worldwide to earn a Nobel Peace Prize. Her efforts to improve social services and communities and to train leaders to carry out this work led to the opening of the first professional school of social work—named in her honor—at the University of Illinois, Chicago. Her writing, teaching, and actions were based on the belief that “without the advance and improvement of the whole, no man can hope for any lasting improvement in his own moral or material individual condition.”