Poverty

Abstract The People’s Institute was organized in 1904 to improve living conditions for the women and children in the northern end of Portland. The impetus for the Institute was a report by Valentine Prichard, supervisor of the public school kindergartens and principal of a training school for kindergarten teachers. This report, given in 1902 to Dr. Edgar P. Hill, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, along with Caroline Ladd and her daughter Helen Ladd Corbett, described the deplorable conditions...

Abstract

The People’s Institute worked to provide social services for the urban poor while the Portland Free Dispensary was an early effort to provide health services to the underserved. They served as a model of collaboration between the city’s charitable organizations and its medical community. This collection contains a variety of reports, correspondence, and other materials relating to the work of the People's Institute and Portland Free Dispensary.

Abstract Started in 1904 by Valentine Prichard and a number of interested parties, the People's Institute grew over the years to provide services to the poor and those unable to pay for medical services. in 1910, members of the University of Oregon Medical School were appointed trustees and assigned fourteen staff to the dispensary. In 1931, after 24 years of operation, the People's Institute and Free Dispensary was re-deployed as the Outpatient Clinic and fully under the Medical School. This...

Abstract

This collection is a wide variety of correspondence to and from the Portland Free Dispensary in its last year (1929-30) before moving up to the medical school campus on Marquam Hill in 1931.

Abstract

These materials come from Joy Spalding's research and writing on the history of the Portland chapter of the Physicians for Social Responsibility. Materials include correspondence, meeting minutes, campaign information, articles and clippings, reports, and ephemera.