Dates: December 25, 1821 - April 12, 1912
Occupation: nurse, humanitarian, teacher
Known for: Civil War service; founder of American Red Cross
Also known as: Clarissa Harlowe Baker
Religion: raised in the Universalist church; as an adult, briefly explored Christian Science but did not join
Organizations: American Red Cross, International Red Cross, U.S. Patent Office
Background, Family:
- Father: Stephen Barton, farmer, selectman, and legislator (Massachusetts)
- Mother: Sarah (Sally) Stone Barton
- four older siblings: two brothers, two sisters
Education:
- Liberal Institute, Clinton, NY (1851)
Marriage, Children:
- Clara Barton never married nor had children
About Clara Barton:
Clara Barton was the youngest of five children in a Massachusetts farming family. She was ten years younger than the next-youngest sibling. As a child, Clara Barton heard stories of wartime from her father, and, for two years, she nursed her brother David through a long illness. At fifteen, Clara Barton began teaching in a school that her parents started to help her learn to transcend her shyness, sensitivity, and hesitation to act.
After a few years of teaching in local schools, Clara Barton started a school in North Oxford, and served as a school superintendent. She went to study at the Liberal Institute in New York, and then began teaching in a school in Bordentown, New Jersey. At that school, she convinced the community to make the school free, an unusual practice in New Jersey at that time. The school grew from six to six hundred students, and with this success, it was determined that the school should be headed by a man, not a woman. With this appointment, Clara Barton resigned, after a total of 18 years in teaching.
In 1854, her home town Congressman helped her obtain an appointment by Clarles Mason, Commissioner of Patents, to work as a copyist in the Patent Office in Washington, DC. She was the first woman in the United States to hold such a government appointment. She copied secret papers during her time in this job. During 1857 - 1860, with an administration that supported slavery which she opposed, she left Washington, but worked at her copyist job by mail. She returned to Washington after the election of President Lincoln.
