Nursing photos displayed at Cushwa Hall

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

“Pictures of Nursing: The Zwerdling Postcard Collection” is on display in the atrium of Cushwa Hall through Dec. 4.

The exhibit about the history of nursing was developed and produced by the U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, curated by Julia Hallam, Ph.D., and is sponsored by the YSU Melnick Medical Museum.

The exhibit explores an archive of nearly 2,600 postcards and more than 100 years of images of nurses and the nursing profession.

“This unique archive consists of postcards with images of nurses and the nursing profession from around the world, produced between 1893 and 2011 with many examples coming from the Golden Age of postcards – roughly 1907 to 1920,” says the U.S. National Library of Medicine website.

“These images of nurses and nursing are informed by cultural values; ideas about women, men and work; and attitudes toward class, race and national differences. By documenting the relationship of nursing to significant forces in 20th-century life, such as war and disease, these postcards reveal how nursing was seen during those times.”

The traveling exhibition highlights only a small selection from the Zwerdling collection; 500 more postcards are available to view in the exhibition’s online digital gallery.