Biographical / Historical

St. Vincent's Hospital, founded in Manhattan in 1849, grew to become a major urban medical center before closing in 2010. Sponsored by the Sisters of Charity and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn, St. Vincent's occupied a preeeminent place in the constellation of Catholic medical institutions centered in New York City. The hospital's School of Nursing, founded in 1892, was one of the state's first nursing schools to obtain registration by the Regents of the University of the State of New York, in 1905. It continued to graduate nurses until 1999.

Patricia Mary (McNicholl) Quill, principal donor of this collection, obtained a degree in nursing from the St. Vincent's Hospital School of Nursing in 1956. She continued with a Master of Science degree from Lehman College, and a School Nurse Practitioner certification from the Health Science Center at Syracuse, now Upstate Medical University. Quill was the Coordinator of Healthy Services for the Orange Ulster Board of Cooperative Educational Services, a state mandated regional public education service organization, providing a wide range of educational development, technological, and administrative programs for New York's public school districts. A nurse practitioner, Quill worked closely with the New York State Coalition of Nurse Practitioners (NYSCONP) in its efforts to obtain professional validation and prescriptive authority for the state's nurse practitioners; Quill served as president of the organization. The portions of her donation relevant to NYSCONP have been incorporated into that collection. In 2000, Quill became president of The American College of Nurse Practitioners.

Pamela J. Brink, RN, PhD, FAAN, combined nursing degrees from Mount Saint Mary's College, Los Angeles, and the Catholic University, Washington, DC, with a doctorate in cultural anthropology from Boston University. She is retired from academic positions at UCLA, the University of Alberta, and the University of Iowa, and for thirty years she served as editor of The Western Journal of Nursing Research . Dr. Brink gave the 1953 St. Vincent's Hospital nursing procedure manual from her personal collection.

Scope and Contents

The St. Vincent's Hospital School of Nursing Collection consists of two subgroups of materials. The first comprises items generally related to the school, itself, while materials in the second pertain to the school Alumnae Association. Of particular importance in the first group is the 1953 nursing procedure manual and items published by the school honoring its centennial in 1992. Also included is a historical sketch and keepsakes saved by Patricia Quill as a student. Alumnae Association materials include a 1999 directory of members; alumnae comments on the school closure; an incomplete set of newsletters released between 1981 and 2018 describing alumnae activities, school news and events; and sets of reunion photographs for the Class of 1956, largely taken by Quill.

Arrangement

Box 1, containing the school items, is ordered chronologically, with the exception of two folders placed at the beginning: Patricia Quill's correspondence with the Bjoring History Center and Quill biographical information. Box 2, containing the Alumnae Association materials, is arranged first in alphabetical subject-category folders, then chronologically.