{{Short description|American nurse}} [[File:Bertha Wright.jpg|thumb|Bertha Wright, 1901 graduation photo, courtesy of [[Children's Hospital Oakland]]]]
'''Bertha Wright''' (June 17, 1876 – May 6, 1971) was a pioneering public health nurse, one of the founders of the Baby Hospital, which later became the [[Children's Hospital Oakland]].<ref name="Working Nurse">{{cite web|title=Bertha Wright, Pioneer in California Public Health Nursing|url=http://www.workingnurse.com/articles/Bertha-Wright-Pioneer-in-California-Public-Health-Nursing|website=Working Nurse|accessdate=6 January 2018}}</ref>
==Early life== Bertha Wright was born in San Francisco, on June 17, 1876, the daughter of Horatio Nelson Wright (1840–1925) and Frances Allen "Fanny" Cheever (1850–1917).
In 1901 she graduated from the California Women's Hospital School of Nursing in San Francisco.
==Career== Bertha Wright was a visiting nurse, and she saw first-hand the need of an hospital dedicated to the caring of children.<ref name="PubMed">{{cite journal|title=Case study of institution-building by nurse Bertha Wright and colleagues|journal=Image: The Journal of Nursing Scholarship|volume=30|issue=4|pages=385–9|pmid=9866302|year=1998|last1=Nichols|first1=D. J|last2=Hammer|first2=M. S|doi=10.1111/j.1547-5069.1998.tb01338.x}}</ref>
She founded the first nursing school in Alameda County. Wright was also an instructor of postgraduate nursing students at [[University of California, Berkeley]]. She became involved in many activities that were considered progressive at the time, including advocating for feminism.<ref name="Working Nurse" />
When the 1906 Earthquake struck San Francisco, Wright was working at the Children's Hospital at the time. She treated patients at the Army General Hospital at the Presidio and at the temporary tents in [[Golden Gate Park]]. Soon after she became the home secretary of the Charitable Organization Society<ref name="Working Nurse" />
Under Wright’s support, the Berkeley Day Hospital and Berkeley Clinic provided services to the poorest population. She established the Berkeley Day Nursery, the first public child day care center in California.<ref name="Working Nurse" />
In 1909, Mabel Weed replaced Wright as secretary of the Charitable Organization Society, and Wright became the [[district nurse]] for the Berkeley Schools.<ref name="San Francisco Call">{{cite journal|title=Seek to Foreclose the Big Mortgage - 7 April 1909|journal=San Francisco Call|date=1909|volume=105|issue=128|url=https://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=d&d=SFC19090407.2.64.17&e=-------en--20--201--txt-txIN-Bertha+Wright-----|accessdate=6 January 2018}}</ref><ref name="Working Nurse" />
In 1912, Wright and a group of local women founded the Baby Hospital in Oakland. The Baby Hospital, later to become the [[Children's Hospital Oakland]], opened in 1914 with 38 beds in an old residential building.<ref name="Working Nurse" />
==Personal life== Bertha Wright and Mabel Weed met when they were both working at the Charity Organization Society in Berkeley. The two women moved in together, and Weed adopted three children: Philip, Alice Barbara and Jean. They also raised a number of foster children together. Wright and Weed moved to [[Palo Alto, California]] in 1938, and they fostered several more children from foster care before Wright's death in 1971.<ref name="Working Nurse" />
==References== {{Reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Wright, Bertha}} [[Category:1876 births]] [[Category:1971 deaths]] [[Category:People from San Francisco]] [[Category:Burials at Alta Mesa Memorial Park]]