Open for use in Social Welfare History Archives reading room.
The National Association of Social Workers retains copyright.
The National Association of Social Workers records were a gift of the National Association of Social Workers board of directors, received in July 1964. The records of the Washington office were added in 1971.
The NASW records were received, administered, and described in two distinct entities. The initial accession, received in 1964 and comprising primarily the pre-1955 records of the predecessor organizations, were arranged and described upon arrival. A large shipment of records from the organization's Washington office, received in 1971, was described in less detail and administered as a separate "supplement" collection. The description of all NASW records, including smaller subsequent accretions, will be integrated into a single finding aid in this online version in the future. As a first step, the detailed contents listing of the record groups included in the initial accession (primarily pre-1955 materials) are gradually being included.
The collection is arranged in ten record groups, each comprising the records of a separate organization -- the seven predecessor organizations that merged in 1955; two transitional organizations that operated during the merger process; and the post-1955 records of the National Association of Social Workers itself. The ten record groups are:
A detailed description of most of this collection is included in
University of Minnesota Libraries,
The National Association of Social Workers (NASW) was established in October, 1955, following five years of careful planning by the Temporary Inter-Association Council (TIAC). Seven organizations – American Association of Social Workers (AASW), American Association of Medical Social Workers (AAMSW), National Association of School Social Workers (NASSW), American Association of Psychiatric Social Workers (AAPSW), American Association of Group Workers UAW Association for the Study of Community Organization (ASCO), and Social Work Research Group (SWRG) – merged to form the NASW.
The bulk of the records is from the seven organizations for professional social workers that merged in 1955 to form the National Association of Social Workers. They were the American Association of Social Workers, the American Association of Psychiatric Social Workers, the National Association of School Social Workers, the American Association of Group Workers, the Association for the Study of Community Organization, and the Social Work Research Group. Collectively they document the development from vocational placement bureaus into professional organizations concerned with raising professional standards and improving education offerings and working conditions. Secondarily they reflect the impact of war and of depression era social and economic programs on social workers and on the people they served.
This collection is indexed under the following headings in the catalog of the University of Minnesota Libraries. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons or places should search the catalog using these headings.
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: Established in 1917 as the National Social Workers' Exchange and reorganized in 1921 as the American Association of Social Workers, the organization addressed issues of concern, set professional standards, and (in the early years) served as a placement bureau for social workers. It was one of seven organizations that merged in 1955 to form the National Association of Social Workers.
The American Association of Social Workers was one of the seven predecessor organizations which formed the National Association of Social Workers in 1955; and its papers were included as a part of the NASW records. Correspondence, memoranda, reports, minutes and agendas of governing bodies and committees, and financial records constitute, in general, the type of papers contained in the collection. The organization's papers comprised thirteen linear feet with the heaviest concentration of material in the 1930's and 1940's. An invaluable aid to this collection is the Association journal, The Compass and its successor, the Social Work Journal, which was employed to reconstruct portions of the development of the American Association of Social Workers not covered fully in the collection.
As the senior professional social work organization, the American Association of Social Workers traces its origin to the Intercollegiate Bureau of Occupations. The Bureau was founded in 1911 by a group of New York alumnae of various colleges to provide vocational information to young ladies seeking employment in New York City. The many questions received concerning social work positions led, in 1913, to the formation of a special department within the Bureau -- the Department of Social Workers. Functioning as a clearinghouse for information regarding social workers and social work positions, the department also emphasized better standards in its placement and publications. The decision to become an independent organization war, made in 1917, and the National Social Workers Exchange (NSWE) was established with its own board of directors. The purpose of the Exchange was "to develop a better adjustment between workers and positions in the social field, to discover new opportunities, to encourage adequate preparation and professional training, to facilitate the choice of competent candidates for positions, and to secure equitable standards of employment."
The National Social Workers Exchange held its first meeting on May 18, 1918. Meeting concurrently with the National Conference of Social Work in Kansas City, a nominating committee composed of Arthur P. Kellogg, Ida M. Cannon, Alfred Fairbank, Gertrude Vaile and Edith Abbott presented a slate of candidates for board of directors. Edith Shatto King was named manager of the NSWE, while the elected officers were Richard H. Edwards, president; C. C. Carstens, vice president; Margaret Byington, secretary; and James S. Cushman, treasurer. At the third annual meeting in New Orleans, a resolution for incorporation "under Article III of the Membership Corporations Laws of the State of New York, pursuant to Section 5 of said law" was authorized by the national body.
In 1920, the board of directors set up a central council, which in turn, appointed committees on placement, job analysis, training, industrial service, recruiting information, publicity and education. The official organ of the Exchange, The Compass was first published in December 1920. An executive committee was formed and its membership roll included C. C. Carstens, J. Bradley Buell, Clare M. Tousley, James S. Cushman, Harriet Anderson, Grace H. Childs, David H. Holbrook, Philip P. Jacobs, and Mary Van Kleeck. Before the annual meeting on June 27, 1921, Graham Romeyn Taylor, son of the settlement leader, Graham Taylor, was appointed national director.
The Exchange continued to function as a non-profit employment agency, but the need for a distinctly professional organization of social workers developed. In short, according to discussion in The Compass for that year, the Exchange had to become more than an employment bureau. Thus, at Kilbourn Hall in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the NSWE became the American Association of Social Workers (AASW) -- an organization formed to stimulate professional growth in social work and offering a vocational placement service. The elected officials of the newly named organization were Owen R. Lovejoy, president; Clare M. Tousley, first vice-president; Gertrude Vaile, second vice-president; Rose J. McHugh, third vice-president; Josiah B. Buell, secretary; and W. W. Norton, treasurer.
Providence, Rhode Island was selected as the place of the annual meeting in June 1922, and it was here that the central council became the national council. A report of a special committee, headed by Harry Hopkins, was also read. He spelled out a financial policy for the Association. Duly adopted by the assembled membership, this program, hereafter known as the "Providence Resolution," provided that dues and contributions from members would support all Association activities, after January 1, 1923. This undertaking was ideally to be realized by January 1, 1925 and in the interim, financial assistance would come from the above-mentioned sources as well from foundation grants. Financial difficulties forced the deadline to be extended to January 1927. The goal was finally met when the decision was made to separate the Vocational Bureau from the Association, as its operating costs were draining funds the treasury.
Structurally the organization experimented with several types of governing bodies. Through the course of the Association's existence governmental responsibility shifted from one group to another. The national council succeeded the original body of authority, the central council, in 1922. An executive committee was appointed to run Association affairs between council meetings. The national council became so unwieldy and its membership so widely distributed that it caused the council to lose its directing capability. In 1926 the executive committee assumed administrative duties. The national council henceforth functioned as a delegate body acting in an intermediary, advisory capacity. To compensate for the loss of' the council, an ad interim committee of the executive committee was created to act on urgent matters subject to final approval by the higher authority. The first members were Neva Deardorff, Dorothy C. Kahn, William Hodson, Linton B. Swift, John A. Fitch, and Katharine Tucker.
Since the formation of the Association, the following secretaries have directed the Association’s affairs in the national offices: Graham Re Taylor, 1921-1922; Edith Shatto King (acting executive secretary) 1922-1923; Philip Klein, 1923-1927, with assistance from Elizabeth de Schweinitz (Mrs. Karl de Schweinitz). Walter West assumed the position in November, 1927.
With the advent of the "Great Depression" and social work's greater interest and involvement in government programs dealing with relief on state and federal levels, financial problems and overwork plagued the organization. According to Compass reports, the executive committee found itself burdened by administrative detail, and consequently lacked correlation with national committees. In 1934 action was taken to decentralize the governing committee's responsibilities by creating divisions which would be guided internally by steering committees. Certain administrative committees were left out of the divisional scheme, i.e., national membership, publications, and chapter organization. The main concerns of the Association were reflected in the division titles: government and social work, personnel standards, employment practices, and personnel practices.
A word of explanation is necessary to describe the complicated evolution of the division on government and social work. At its annual meeting in Minneapolis in June 1931, the assembled membership of AASW authorized the formation of the commission on unemployment, which was to gather information on local situations through AASW chapters, and study and report on proposed programs meant to deal with unemployment, i.e., federal relief fund. A second assignment involved the study of the social and economic effects of unemployment and the possible regularization of employment by unemployment insurance. The first chairman of the commission was Mary Van Kleeck who was supported by a panel of distinguished citizens: Joseph P. Chamberlain, Stanley Be Davies, Helen Hall, David H. Holbrook, Porter R. Lee, Betsey Libbey, Harry Lurie, Linton B. Swift, Frances Taussig, and Walter West.
Coincidentally, executives of national agencies called for the Social Work Conference on Federal Action to discuss plans for action on governmental programs. The steering committee of this conference, with Linton B. Swift as its chairman, became the AASW's committee on federal relief under the auspices of the Commission on Unemployment. Not content with this label, the committee was renamed the federal action on unemployment committee. Linton Swift chaired the committee; its membership included Benson Y. Landis, Frank Bane, Allen T. Burns, C. C. Carstens, Joanna C. Colcord, Helen Crosby, David H. Holbrook, Paul U. Kellogg, Harry L. Lurie, the Rev. Dr. John O'Grady, Helen Hall, Ralph G. Hurlin, Walter Went, and Stanley B. Davies. Lack of funds caused the chairman of the commission to ask for the commission's discharge in April, 1933, but as many functions as possible were assumed by the division on government and social work under its first chairman, Linton B. Swift.
Dissatisfaction with this divisional structure was brought to the surface in August 1938, by the resignation of Florence Taylor (Mrs. Graham R. Taylor), who had served as an assistant executive secretary. She pointed out that the executive committee left too such decision making to the executive secretary. The ad interim committee could not cope with the responsibilities developing because the executive committee met too infrequently, the committees were too loosely organized, there was too heavy an administrative burden for the national office, and a difference of opinion existed regarding the basic policies and program of the Association. Faced with such explicit criticism, measures were taken the following year to remedy the situation by creating a new governing body, the national board of directors, from whose ranks an executive committee would be selected to exercise the powers of the national board between meetings of the latter group. Due to the reorganizational shuffle, the divisional apparatus gradually faded out, to be replaced by regionalized national committees. By March, 1941, the outstanding committees were executive, national membership, government and social work, personnel practices, chapter, personnel practices for national staff, and nominating. This basic pattern, changed only by addition or deletion of national committees, remained true of the Association's structure till dissolution in 1955.
The problem of administrative structure was thus amended. However, matters of procedures continued to plague personnel and employment practices' investigations, i.e., employment practices inquiry, 1940. The division of opinion regarding basic doctrine of the Association remained unresolved. One member commented that the struggle to solve these issues caused a loss of momentum in the Association's forward progress and resulted in the resignations of president, executive secretary, and members of the executive committee and board of directors. This period, 1941-1943, was one of internal dissension within all sections of the organization. After Walter West's resignation in the early part of 1942, Elisabeth Mills served as acting executive secretary until the appointment of Joseph P. Anderson as executive secretary on May 15, 1942. Anderson continued in that capacity until the dissolution of AASW in 1955 at which time he became the executive secretary of National Association of Social Workers.
Beset with financial difficulties and a scattered membership involved in defense concerns during the Second World War, national conferences were canceled in 1943 and 1945. However, during the postwar period, the Association grew steadily. Reflecting the growth of professionalism in social work, The Compass became the Social Work Journal in 1948. Simultaneously preliminary discussions were initiated with other professional social work organizations to examine the possibility of merging operations to best further the social work profession as a whole. This inquiry led to the formation of the Temporary Inter Association Council in which the AASW took a leading role. (The records of AASW's participation on the Council have been placed with others to form a more unified TIAC Section.)
A chronological statement of organizational highlights and a list of AASW presidents follow:
List of AASW Presidents, 1921-1955:
SCOPE AND CONTENT: Correspondence, memoranda, reports, minutes and agendas of governing bodies and committees, and financial records constitute, in general, the type of papers contained in the collection. Records date from the AASW's origins in 1922 until the 1955 merger, but the bullk of the material is concentrated in the 1930's and 1940's.
AASW's records have been divided into two major sections, the first of which shows chronologically the organizational development of the Association, i.e., constitution, bylaws, policy statements, board and committee minutes, conference proceedings, registration of members, personnel practices, finances, and chapter information (folders 1-154). The second division also includes records of the organization; because of their degree of specialization, they are arranged in an alphabetical, topical order, i.e., armed forces, ethics, government and social work, Donald S. Howard correspondence (AASW president, 1947-1949), migrants, National Recovery Administration, political parties, the practitioners movement, Social Security Act, war activities and the Wartime Committee on Personnel (folders 155-263). A list of publications removed from the AASW section and placed in the Minnesota Center's ephemera collection is included in the appendix.
Copy of first approved constitution of National Social Workers’ Exchange and a proposed constitution for a new professional organization of social workers .
Historical data on formation of NSWE and transition to AASW in 1921. Minutes of meetings of NSWE and AASW, joint meeting with Association of Training Schools re training problems, round table discussions on terminology, "Providence Resolution," separation of Vocational Bureau from AASW.
Statements on Association program for the years 1938-1940 and excerpts by Walter West, executive secretary, and Wayne McMillen, president, from a special study of the Association, 1941-1942.
Proceedings of hearing on Association program by national office, questions for discussion, and miscellaneous correspondence.
Inquiry report by Walter West, executive secretary, re employment practices of the family Service Society of St. Louis County, Missouri.
Study by executive committee.
Minutes cover investigation of Association, 1941-1942, problems of qualification for membership, and over-view of organizational affairs.
Minutes and correspondence re group insurance and retirement benefits. Correspondents include Theodate Soule (American Association of Hospital Social Workers), Walter West, and Sophonisba P. Breckinridge, who requested support for the Child Labor Amendment and suggested an insurance plan.
Correspondence re evaluating executive secretary.
Correspondence re Association difficulties, 1941-1942; search for a new executive secretary; appointment of Joseph P. Anderson as secretary; and membership qualifications of group workers within AASW.
Historical data on Association progress from NSWE to AASW; minutes of central council; financial difficulties of AASW; Association disagreements, 1942-1943; wartime activities; and formation of Temporary Inter-Association Council.
Report stating grievances against Walter West, executive secretary, and Wayne McMillen, president.
Statements by Wayne McMillen re Association program; accumulation of data for charges re president’s conduct by the executive committee; tentative statement, "The Conduct of the President as a Factor in the Association Problem."
Report of subcommittee, headed by Lester Granger, NAACP executive secretary, re personnel study of AASW, including budget statement, change of address procedures, membership application processing, job descriptions, dues collection, and accounting systems.
Minutes, memoranda, reports, and correspondence re local draft boards and AASW aid; public social services; report, "Recreation, Education and Welfare of the American Soldier"; summary of activities; and dissolution material of committee reelecting Association financial difficulties.
Correspondence re grievance procedures from John A. Fitch and the National Association of Legal Aid Organizations re disciplinary action in grievance proceedings; reports from Chicago chapter re development of statement of principles.
Brief correspondence covering a series of cases showing the interest of politicians in relief programs.
Correspondence and newspaper clippings- re grievances in Columbus, Ohio, and Denver, Colorado, as well as six individual cases.
Reports, bulletins, memoranda, and minutes re formation of an international social welfare organization, continuation of services during the war, social welfare activities of the League of Nations, and cooperation services in Gary, Indiana.
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Audrey J. Maetzgold, student at New York School of Social Work and former Red Cross worker, compiled a report for AASW committee on the United Nations*; involvement with international cooperation for social welfare. Contains progress report and summary minutes re the United Nations’ activities in social welfare.
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Consists largely of process whereby committee gathered information to be published in a job analysis series, e.g., Louise Odencrantz, The Social Worker in Familyt Medical and Psychiatric Social Work.
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Memoranda, reports, and correspondence to gather information from other organizations on salaries. Newspaper clippings have been placed in the backs of folders for better preservation of manuscripts, unless they are an integral part of the material.
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Annual Membership Count
AASW: Membership Committee, Application Forms, Membership Cards, Bills, and Sample Stencils, 1919-1945.
Minutes of applications and national membership committee wherein discussions evolve around clarification of classification of elected members, membership qualifications, standards, and members elected under provision of Section 6 qualification.
Study of application of standards to technical courses at colleges and universities offering courses in social work.
Data on readmission of former members, definition and purpose of membership policy, and membership requirements.
Brochures from NSWE and AASW.
Memoranda and minutes "outlining the general content and plan for study of the problems related to the organization and planning of social services" in wartime and reconstruction.
Correspondence with Michael J. Shortly, director of vocational rehabilitation, Federal Security Agency Compass article, Rehabilitation of Handicapped Persons."
Reports and memoranda re approved technical courses, professional membership, skills of relief workers, and standards in social work stated by Grace Marcus and Walter West.
Correspondence between Herschel Alt, chairman of national committee on education, and Grace Marcus, chairman of division on personnel standards, re developing and supporting professional education in cooperation with American Association of Schools of Social Work.
Correspondence, agendas, and memoranda re recruiting personnel for professional education.
Proceedings and manuals for AASW conferences; first delegate conference: "Governmental Objectives for Social Work," 1934, with Grace Abbott, Fred Hoehler, Porter K. Lee, Wayne McMillen, Gertrude Springer, Kenneth Pray, Harry Hopkins, and Arthur Dunham re tasks of those in social work involved with governmental policies and agencies. Other proceedings included: 1935-1937, 1939-1941, 1947, 1949, and 1953. Delegates manuals for the years 1941, 1948, and 1950 are also included, plus a list of nominating districts for the 1953 delegate assembly.
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Proceedings of regional workshops: Southeast States, February, 1952; Chicago, May, 1952; Los Angeles, November, 1952; New England Regional, November, 1952; Fort Worth, Texas, February, 1953; North Mid-Western, October, 1953; St. Louis, February, 1954; District 5 (Ann Arbor, Michigan), April, 1954 North West, April, 1954; Mountain States, May, 1954; District 6, October, 1945, AASW Workshop on Legal Regulation of Social Work Practice, February, 1955-
Office manual on nomination and election procedure including a time schedule for July 1, 1953 to June 30, 1954; personnel of nominating committee; 1954 ballot; "Proposed Bylaws and Memorandum of Understanding," of TIAC; list of officers and members of the board of directors of NASW, September, 1955.
Materials on use of punch card tabulating equipment to handle membership records for a central registry of social workers undertaken by David French, Joe R. Hoffer, and Joseph P. Anderson; classification of social work studies; Joe R. Hoffer, "Basic Schedule— Social Workers."
Progress report by Joe R. Hoffer, (then director of Social Work Vocational Bureau) re need of classifying workers and positions to aid in placement service for social welfare workers.
Report sent out to members to stimulate discussion of Association objectives and program at the 1951 delegate conference.
Unofficial report
Booklet prepared for fourth annual AASW conference.
Statement adopted at 1947 delegate conference.
Statement prepared by committee on licensing to encourage discussion among members re licensing social workers.
Draft of handbook prepared for Personnel Practices Institute by personnel practices committee.
Proceedings of institute sponsored by the Ohio Welfare Conference, National Conference of Social Work, National Social Welfare Assembly, and Ohio Citizens Council.
Statement re standards for social work personnel, code of ethics, civil rights in social work, and personnel practices in social work adopted by 1961 delegate assembly.
Mimeographed statement approved by 1951 delegate assembly.
Correspondence and reports of procedure in grievance cases using specific cases as examples.
Handbook for AASW chapter committees on violation of personnel practices.
Sample of mimeographed materials circulated by the national office; agendas, memoranda, handbooks, committee reports, chapter communiques, etc. (Folders 111-112 arranged numerically, folder 113 arranged chronologically.)
See introduction for instructions on use of these records.
See introduction for instructions on use of these records.
See introduction for instructions on use of these records.
Chiefly correspondence re inclusion of national staff of AASW, a non-profit organization, for social insurance benefits; chronological history of negotiations compiled by Dorothy C. Kahn.
Memoranda, pamphlets, and printed statements re staff records on social security, etc. Historical data on beginnings of social security and processes involved in securing enrollment under plan, especially in New York State; suggested social workers’ platform on social security.
Alphabetical arrangement of financial records of AASW from late 1954 till dissolution in September,. 1955
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Reports from chapters: Cleveland, Toledo, New York city; position papers of AASW; 1945 hand-book for chapter officers.
Reference manual on chapter administration.
Alphabetical listing, by state, of chapters’ final report preceding October, 1955 dissolution,.
Andersen was Executive Secretary, 1943-1955
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Correspondence with charity organization society division of Russell Sage Foundation, particularly Joanna C. Colcord and Donald S. Howard (AASW President, 1947-1949)• Subjects covered are Joanna C. Colcord’s participation in AASW (until 1940), surplus commodities, AASW statement on foreign relief programs, UNRRA and the AASW draft statement on long range provision for displaced persons.
Brief correspondence re National Vocational Service, committee structure, and Southern participation in Association.
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Preparatory material.
Brief folder including agendas, AASW public welfare platform (1947) and minutes.
Correspondence, memoranda, and minutes. Statements on "New Frontiers in Social Work," AASW public social services, effect of war on social work in local communities, and foreign relief.
Minutes, correspondence, agendas, statement of committee assignment, and drafts for proposed statement by the Association.
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Several drafts of constitution with suggestions from Mary Van Kleeck.
Historical data on plans for the fourth international convention.
Notes on committee meeting and request for funds to support conference.
Notice of Howard Knight’s death (executive secretary of the National Conference of Social Work), correspondence from Dr. Rene Sand (president, ICSW), Fred Hoehler, George Haynes (treasurer-general, ICSW), Leonard Mayo (then president of NCSW), Ernest F. Witte, and Melvin Glasser, plus a membership list of the program committee.
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Correspondence, memoranda, and listing of topics.
Copies of three of the speeches.
Correspondence, minutes, memoranda, agendas, reports on reorganization of ICSW, tentative ICSW program schedules, material on appointment of Joseph P. Anderson as ICSW acting secretary general, United States Department of State "briefs" for foreign visitors, and committee membership list.
Correspondence, newspaper clippings, reports, handbooks, pamphlets, and memoranda from national office. Prominent in the folders are David H. Holbrook, Katharine F. Lenroot, Russell H. Kurtz, Helen R. Jeter (secretary, Family Security Committee), Walter McGuinn (dean, Boston College School of Social Work), Robert Lane (executive director, Welfare Council of New York City), Elizabeth Ross (director, AAPSW War Service Office), and John J. McCloy. Material re selective service, Canadian social workers in Royal Canadian Army, morale of servicemen, placement of social work graduates, cooperation with AAPSW in War Service Office, formation of Wartime Committee on Personnel, military classification of social workers, WACs as psychiatric social workers, and social work standards in the U.S. Army.
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Correspondence, press releases, newspaper clippings, pamphlets, and report re family allowances and allotments of servicement. Correspondents include William Hodson, Dorothy C. Kahn, Jane Hoey, Paul Webbink, and various chapter members.
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Correspondence, newsletters, statements, and memoranda re chapter activities and selective service, and position of public welfare departments or agencies re conscription, local public welfare activities, and consultation centers.
Correspondence, newspaper clippings, pamphlets, and bulletins re protection and rights of conscientious objectors; Louisiana laws re objectors.
Correspondence re need for psychiatric social workers in centers and classification needed for Army social workers.
Correspondence, reports, bulletins, press releases, and newspaper clippings re Class III deferment (deferred because of dependents); drafting social workers; New York chapter statement, "Suggested Position of AASW on Deferment of Social Workers."
Correspondence, press releases, and newspaper clippings re student deferment and deferment of medical students.
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Correspondence with social worker in Armed Forces re detention unit at Camp Pickett, Virginia.
Information guide published by American Council on Education.
Survey of social caseworkers in Army and number of graduates of schools of social work or with partial training in Armed Forces; military classification; listing of men in service and degree of social work education.
Correspondence and memoranda. Correspondence between AASW and a member, 1941-1943? re organization of Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, mental hygiene units; Mental Hygiene reprint, "Mental Hygiene Unit"; Transportation Corps school, New Orleans Army Base, Mental Hygiene Aids for the Line Officer (August, 1945).
Correspondence with social worker in service connected to the War Department and national office re pool of specialists available for service; commissions for social workers; Lehman committee; and program of division of military government.
Correspondence of Joseph P. Anderson re social work material for newsletter.
Correspondence with E. H. Ross of AAPSW’s war service office concerning problems of social workers in armed forces; Army hygiene units; classification of social workers; formation of Wartime Committee on Personnel by AASW; standards for military psychiatric social work; statement on Veterans Administration social work personnel and practice, and the Veterans Administration Corps Bill.
Correspondence re enlistment of WACs as psychiatric social workers, American Nurses Association, John J. McCloy, Elizabeth de Schweinitz; definition of military psychiatric social workers; WAG recruiting standards.
National organization correspondence collecting information on members’ activities, on use made of social work skills and experience in armed services, and, in turn, keeping members informed of Association activities as well as maintaining membership records and continuing dues collection. Arranged chronologically.
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Bulletins, memoranda, and pamphlets re information on selective service; selective service regulations; explanation of Class III deferments
Correspondence, pamphlets, memoranda, and statements re classification problems in Army, particularly securing classification for social workers; an address, "Classification Problems"; Luther E. Woodward, National Committee for Mental Hygiene, "The Value of Social History in Selection for the Armed Forces"; New Jersey chapter, AASW, "Handbook for Guidance of Social and Health Counsellor"; draft of a. platform for wartime welfare services in relation to manpower problems, and chapter activity for induction centers.
Correspondence, news release, interview report re screening process of selective service, data collected for use of Medical Advisory Board, military classification of social workers.
Materials re medical survey registrants.
Correspondence, releases, reports, radio script re medical survey. Reports and memoranda from Luther E. Woodward re survey, financial assistance from Social Security Board for survey (Jane Hoey), instructions to medical field agents, and sample information cards used in the medical survey.
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Correspondence and memoranda re chapter volunteers for gathering material for medical survey in Chicago, New York City, Washington, B.C.; question of violating civil rights raised by membership.
Reports of advisory committee re medical survey, evaluation of Negro social workers, WACs used as psychiatric social workers, standards for Red Cross social workers; designation of Elizabeth Ross (AAPSW) to represent Wartime Committee on Personnel on social service advisory committee to selective service headquarters; Luther E. Woodward’s reports re medical survey, summation of meeting with Army, Navy, psychiatric advisory committee and selective service re medical field agent program.
Correspondence, memoranda, and statements re social work contributions to selective service, i.e., volunteering aid of social workers to selective service (Donald S. Howard, Grace Marcus, and D. C. Kahn); suggestions by Conrad van Hyning, principal assistant, director of public welfare, Washington, B.C., re activity in national defense; Gordon Hamilton, "Suggested Principles for Social Workers on Selective Service Administration"; and reports from chapters on relations with selective service boards.
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Material re need for code of ethics, copies of chapter and private organization codes, correspondence with John D. Kenderdine (associate editor of the Survey) re ethics, publication of Lula Jean Elliott’s pamphlet, Social Work Ethics.
Pamphlets, reprints, and newspaper clippings related to pharmacists, trade associations, doctors, dentists, lawyers, industrial lenders, teachers.
Suggested codes of ethics from chapters, including notes from AASW committee attempting to summarize the issues.
Correspondence, reports, minutes, and conference notes. Correspondents include Joanna C. Colcord, David H. Holbrook (National Social Work Council), Harry L. Lurie, Linton B. Swift, Rt. Rev. John O’Grady, Edward P. Costigan (U.S. Senator, Colorado); conferences with Katharine Lenroot (U.S. Children’s Bureau) and Senator Costigan. Concerns the part social work should have in formulating a program of federal aid for unemployment relief.
(Successor to Steering Committee, Social Work Conference on Federal Action on Unemployment) Minutes, correspondence, and memoranda re Costigan-LaFollette hearing and bill, Federal Relief Administration, Emergency Relief Construction Act (1932), and the Bonus Army (1932); conference with Harry Hopkins, Temporary Emergency Relief Administration (1933)•
(Successor to AASW Committee on Federal Action on Unemployment) Correspondence, minutes, questionnaire, and reports re Federal Emergency Relief Administration, Conference on Governmental Objectives for Social Work, unemployment relief funds, subsistence homesteads, and Civil Works Administration.
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Reports, statements, bulletins, and minutes. Resume of materials includes federal reorganization plans affecting the Children’s Bureau; federal government in field of social service, Harry L. Lurie’s statement, "Administrative . Basis for Social Welfare Programs in the Federal, State, and Local Governments"; program to continue relief after dissolution of FERA; charts of proposed Bureau of Welfare; and formation of subcommittee on federal Department of Welfare.
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Memoranda and statements of subcommittee assigned to "develop general social principles basic in planning a national social welfare program . . . ."
Correspondence and minutes re unemployment compensation due to sickness. Correspondents include Grace Abbott, Antoinette Cannon, and Michael M. Davis (Committee on Research in Medical Economics).
Includes scrapbook of committee, information on Wagner-Ellenbogen Bill (1936), and bulletins.
Minutes and correspondence involve discussion of Wagner Bill, rent policies, and summation of housing activity in United States, 1942
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Information re formation of NHA and its functions. Series of case reports on solutions of housing management problems.
Minutes, correspondence, and comments on training social workers for housing by Leonard Mayo (Western Reserve) and others.
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Memoranda, minutes, and correspondence re formation of a technical advisory committee on national relief policy.
Memoranda, reports, questionnaires, bulletins, and reprints re relief problems and the Emergency Relief Appropriation Act of 1935-
Contains information from chapters re relief programs and attempts to solve problems as seen through the chapters. Situations included are in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Puerto Rico, Washington, B.C., and Washington State.
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Bulletins; clippings re provisions of Economic Security Bill (S. 1130); and material on administering relief and security program, child welfare services under Social Security Act, and unemployment insurance proposals and reports.
Report stating objectives of division on government and social work.
Correspondence and bibliographies concerned with transient and homeless in South Carolina and Illinois; material on migratory labor in California, Dorothy C. Kahn’s participation in Tolan committee hearings (House of Representatives’ committee to investigate interstate migration of destitute citizens), and the platform on interstate migration.
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Largely correspondence re information on NRA.
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Correspondence with National Social Work Council, Linton B. Swift, David H. Holbrook, and Paul U. Kellogg re codes; proposed "Code for Social Service Workers" by Chicago’s Social Workers Discussion Group.
Correspondence with Niles Carpenter of the 1936 Republican National Committee; Walter West’s statement of social work planks to Robert F. Wagner; Walter West’s support of Franklin D. Roosevelt.
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Brief folder.
Correspondence re meetings with national organizations and opposition to the Social Security Act.
Compilation of listings of social work scholarships and fellowship information.
Correspondence and reports on chapter activities in communities near war installations. Material from the North Carolina chapter and the "Eastern Groups." Effects of national defense on rural and farm problems, work relief and social conditions near defense operations in North Carolina, and survey of chapter members’ role in defense activities,
Minutes and memoranda re community problems of national defense, selective service, and confidentiality of records.
Correspondence and memoranda re securing well-qualified social work personnel for civil service administration, job descriptions from Office of Vocational Rehabilitation, and material on the merit system for civil administration.
Correspondence, memoranda, questionnaire, and reports on questionnaire sent to members of professional organizations re their educational plans, employment, training, employment records, and experience in Armed Forces.
Contains newsletters from New York School of Social Work and Louisiana State Department of Public Welfare.
Correspondence and newsletter re activities of Wartime Committee on Personnel, membership list of AASSW, and newsletters to answer questions about social work from those leaving the armed forces.
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: The American Association of Hospital Social Workers (AAMSW) in formed with the adoption of a constitution and bylaws on May 20, 1918. In 1926 AAHSW was incorporated under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and in 1934 it became the American Association of Medical Social Workers, a name it retained until its merger, in 1955, with six other social work membership organizations to become the National Association of Social Workers.
The formal origin of medical social work in America came in 1905 when Dr. Richard Clarke Cabot, staff member of Boston's Massachusetts General Hospital, arranged for the employment of a "person of experience in health and social work" to assist is the out-patient department in solving problem of sickness and ill health related to social factors. Though volunteers and hospital auxiliaries had been engaged for many years in friendly visiting, sewing, and other services to hospitals and patients, this marked the beginning of an effort to provide adequate, consistent professional service to clients.
Organization of hospital social workers on a national scale came in May, 1917, when approximately thirty workers met in Pittsburgh in connection with the National Conference of Social Work to discuss the question of a national organization. Because of the war, further efforts were delayed until the 1918 National Conference in Kansas City, when a series of meetings were held, culminating in the organization of AAHSW.
According to its original constitution, the purpose of AAHSW was "to serve as an organ of intercommunication among hospital social workers, to maintain and improve standards of social work in hospitals and dispensaries, and to stimulate its intensive and extensive development." (The purpose was amended in 194, reflecting changed emphases within the profession, to read: "to promote the quality and effectiveness of social work in relation to health and medical care.") The constitution provided for the offices of president first and second vice-president, secretary, and treasurer, and opened membership to institutions and individuals in the United States and Canada. The bylaws adopted (folders 326-327) set forth duties of the officers and an executive committee, listed qualifications for membership, and provided for an advisory council, annual meetings and procedures for amendment of bylaws.
Original membership qualifications established active, associate, and honorary classes. Active members were paid hospital social workers or executives of social service departments. Associate members included individuals who had been active in hospital social work or allied fields but were not eligible at the time, or those who had only recently begun this work, and social service departments or organizations and institutions in fields allied with medical social work. Honorary members were individuals deemed by the Association to have made a significant contribution to medical social work. Subsequent changes in the constitution (which was repealed in 1944), bylaws, membership qualifications, etc., can be found in the bylaws themselves and the records of the bylaws and membership committees (folders 326-327, 352-353, 507-509).
An executive secretary (titled executive director after 1953) was employed part-time from 1918 and full-time from 1922. From 1936 to 1955 a business manager, Mrs. Ellen Michaels, directed the national office. Other part-time or full-time professional staff members were the consultant on education, Kate McMahon, 1925-1955; consultant on practice, Addie Thomas, 1953-1955 (this position was established in 1953); and consultant on recruitment (a position also established in 1953), Elma Phillipson and, later, Opal Gooden.
In 1920, in an effort to make a national organization less remote and more relevant to individual members scattered across the country, a plan for organization of the Association on a district basis was proposed. At the semi-annual meeting, held in conjunction with the American Hospital Association, the district plan was accepted by the membership with the provision that the executive committee approve district limits and that district constitutions conform to the national constitution. In 1945 specific criteria for districting were adopted. These included, among others, a minimum of 25 potential members, leadership, financial stability, and proposed district limits. During reorganization of the Association, 1940-1942, a plan for establishing five regions for members living in undistricted areas was adopted.
At the 1921 annual meeting, a group of psychiatric social workers who were members of AAHSW, petitioned to form a psychiatric section within AAHSW. In 1922 the Section was formed with its own bylaws, officers, etc. In 1926 the Section dissolved its ties with AAHSW and formed the American Association of Psychiatric Social Workers. One of the major study projects of the Association rose from the education committee's subcommittee on medical social workers' participation in teaching medical students (folders 393-412). In 1943 this subcommittee formed a joint committee with a subcommittee of the Association of American Medical Colleges. With a grant from the Milbank Foundation the joint committee on teaching of social and environmental factors in medicine studied and evaluated the teaching of information, attitudes, and skills in selected medical colleges and schools (folders 401-404). After publication of the study, Widening Horizons in Medical Education A Study of the Teaching of Social and Environmental Factors in Medicine, in 1947, a small Association subcommittee carried on related projects. In 1953 this subcommittee began cooperation with the American Association of Psychiatric Social Workers; this resulted in a joint committee of the two associations which carried on under the National Association of Social Workers as the joint committee on participation in medical education.
Mary A. Stites' detailed History of the American Association of Medical Social Workers (1955) gives a complete picture of the Association's structure and program, its committees and projects, and its development from 1918 to 1955. The Association's executive committee minutes, 1918-1941, (folders 339-345) are also useful in understanding the evolution of the Association and of the medical social work profession.
SCOPE AND CONTENT: The AAMSW records comprise 16.5 linear feet of records covering the years 1917 to 1956. The records have been arranged in so far as possible to reflect the working structure of the Association, are divided in sections.
The first series (folders 325-350) consists of papers tracing the formation and incorporation of AAMSW, its constitution and bylaws, papers of the officers and staff, and records of its policy-making committees and councils. The second series (folders 351-593) constitutes Association committee records, including regular, advisory, joint, and special committees (as far as these can be identified). Because the Association carried on projects largely through its committees and because these records are extensive, many major interests and accomplishments of the Association are reflected here. The third series is papers of the Psychiatric Section (folder 594). Records of the Association consultants on education, practice, and recruitment comprise the fourth series (folders 595-643).
The fifth series (folders 644-678) includes papers of Association districts and regions, arranged by date of admission to the Association. These records reflect the implementation of Association policies on a local level and provide information on activities and concerns of groups of members. The sixth series (folders 679-755) consists of the correspondence and papers of the Association in a subject arrangement. Included among these are financial records (folders 679-690), material pertaining to the transition from AAMSW to the National Association of Social Workers (folder 691), and records of the Association's relations with other voluntary associations and governmental agencies (folders 714-747).
It should be noted that certain themes recur in the AAMSW records so frequently that it is misleading to attempt to single out sections of the collection where they are contained. The records trace the problems of an emerging profession with its concern for definition of function, professional education, standards in practice, and relations with other professions. Maintenance of an adequate supply of trained medical social workers was a central concern of the Association long before the establishment of a recruitment committee in 1953. Also reflected in these records is the impact of war and the Depression on the profession and the interest of medical social workers and persons in related health field agencies in rehabilitation of persons handicapped by disease or injury. The collection, of course, documents trends in medical social work, casework method and skills, the generic-specific debate in social work, etc.
The following individuals appear prominently in these papers: Edith M. Baker, Harriett Bartlett, Helen Beckley, Zdenka Buben, Ida M. Cannon, M. Antoinette Cannon, Eleanor Cockerill, Ruth Cooper, Ruth Emerson, Dora Goldstine, Eckka Gordon, Mary L. Hemmy, Ruth E. Lewis, Mary Maxwell, Kate McMahon, Mary Blanche Hose, Mary L. Poole, Elizabeth P. Rice, Marian E. Russell, Pauline Ryman, Agnes H. Schroeder, Addie Thomas, Lenore Gottfried Van Vliet, Ruth Wadman, Margaret Wagner, Lena R. Waters, and Grace White.
A list of publications removed from the AAMSW section and placed in the Center's ephemera collection is included in the appendix.
Notes of the May, 1917, meeting to consider formation of a national organization of hospital social workers. Correspondence and papers regarding the incorporation of the American Association of Hospital Social Workers in 1926.
Correspondence; papers; and copies of constitutions, bylaws, and amendments to these. Includes lists of early members of the Association.
Reports of annual meetings held each year in conjunction with the National Conference of Social Work.
Association members voted on the question of whether or not AAMSW should continue to participate in the Temporary Inter-Association Council (TIAC), which resulted in formation of the National Association of Social Workers.
Correspondence, minutes, and legal documents. This meeting to formally dissolve the Association was held at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston (where Richard C. Cabot established the first hospital social service department in 1905)
Primarily requests for information addressed to the director (formerly the executive secretary) regarding tuberculosis, blinded veterans, ratio of medical social workers, rehabilitation of handicapped persons, a code of ethics for social workers, etc.
Annual and semi-annual reports to the executive committee or to the Association.
Reports of visits to hospitals, Association districts and regions, attendance at conferences, etc.
Addresses to annual or business meetings of the Association and reports (19^-19^9) to the executive committee.
Correspondence of Association officers. Copy of the Association’s resolution criticizing the destruction of Charlotte Towle’s Common Human Needs by Federal Security Administrator, Oscar R. Ewing.
Brief correspondence. Primarily lists of members of the council, appointed annually by the President to serve as advisors to officers, staff, and members of the Association.
Chiefly memoranda to the committee from the executive director. Material on repeal of the Association constitution, conference on problems of Mexican war workers, hiring of a recruitment consultant, Temporary Inter-Association Council (TIAC), Association
Excerpts from executive committee meetings regarding policy toward relationships with other organizations.
The subcommittee, appointed in July 1934, recommended the retention of the current secretary, Helen Beckley.
Correspondence, reports, and memoranda. Includes material on the Association’s application to the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis for funds, organization of the National Association of Social Workers, hiring of personnel, etc.
Correspondence and reports re the work of the council, whose purpose was to integrate Association study committees and to build a sound program.
The committee was established to study the administration of medical social work.
Correspondence, reports, and copies of proposed amendments to the constitution and the bylaws.
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Correspondence, memorial speeches, and articles about Cabot, who founded the first social service department at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston.
Formerly the case competition committee, which sponsored an annual contest to encourage casework skills. As the case evaluation committee, it evaluated treatment processes in medical social work.
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Individual case records submitted to the committee’s annual contest or submitted for evaluation by the committee.
One report. The committee sought to study the functions and activities of the Association’s standing committees.
Reports.
Correspondence and reports of the committee, which dealt with relations of hospitals and social service departments to the community, especially to community chests.
Formerly the publications committee. Correspondence, reports, and memoranda. Material on advertising, editorial policy, editorial consultants, evolution of a professional journal, public relations, and publication of the Association journal, Medical Socia
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Correspondence, reports, and manuscripts submitted for use by the Association or for publication in Medical Social Work.
Material on Association budgets and financing. The committee had responsibility for seeking contributions from Association districts and individual members.
The committee was appointed in 1949 to assist Mary Stites in writing her history of medical social work.
The advisory committee, formerly a subcommittee of the medical social practice committee, advised Caroline H. Elledge in her study, "Rehabilitation and the Patient.’
Material re child welfare services under the Social Security Act.
Material on the need for hospital social workers overseas.
Minutes and memoranda.
The Association committee advised the Public Health Service in 1920 to establish a social service section in its Hospital Division.
Correspondence and reports re medical social work in tuberculosis control programs.
Correspondence and reports reflecting concerns for differences between medical and psychiatric social work and the work of psychiatric social workers in hospital settings.
Correspondence and reports. Material re use of diet as therapy.
Correspondence, minutes, and reports. The committee, which was established to promote understanding and cooperation between the two associations, surveyed hospital social service departments to provide information on relationships within the hospital.
Correspondence with hospital social service departments participating in the committee study.
Material re function of medical social workers in public health organizations.
Correspondence and handbook for medical social workers in cancer clinics.
Correspondence and reports reflecting concern with the function of medical social workers and the relations of public health nurses to medical social workers.
Reports. The committee recommended that the Association ask its members to respond to proposed legislation as individuals rather than have it take a position as an association.
The committee’s study recommended that the administrative committee take greater responsibility for planning the Association program.
The committee prepared a "Statement of Principles Relating to Medical Social Aspects of a National Health Program."
Material on criteria for organizing Association districts.
The committee was established to clarify policies of communication between districts and national office and to examine the need for more effective publications.
The committee prepared a series of statements of responsibilities of the executive director, president, first vice-president, business manager, and consultants on education and practice.
Report. The committee voted against substituting the office of president-elect for that of first vice-president.
Correspondence and report.
The committee considered whether or not the Association should issue a new statement on national health planning to replace the 1948 statement.
Reports.
Reports and memorandum.
Correspondence, minutes, and reports of the Section, which was established within the Association in 1922 and separated from it in 1926 to become the American Association of Psychiatric Social Workers. Includes a 1944 letter from an Australian social work
Correspondence, minutes, and reports.
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Scattered correspondence of the committee, which was concerned with "psychosomatic thinking" in the casework training of the medical social worker.
The subcommittee sought to identify and define medical social work concepts.
Correspondence, reports, bibliographies, and course outlines.
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Correspondence and papers.
Correspondence and reports re special training for eye clinic staff. Includes a 1936 "Report Regarding Special Courses in Eye Work."
Correspondence, reports, and memoranda. Includes material on the study of field work, definition of terms, problems of field work supervisors, supervision of students in medical social work placements, and contents of field work instruction.
Correspondence and reports re the study of practice in field work training. Includes a final report, "Field Work Teaching in Medical Social Work: A Descriptive Study.’
Primarily correspondence re establishing the subcommittee and defining the area of study.
Correspondence and reports. Material on medical courses for social workers, public health content in the curriculum, medical social work subject matter, and health problems in casework.
Correspondence and reports re the "induction" period.
Formerly the committee on participation in teaching social and environmental factors in medicine. Correspondence, minutes, and reports.
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Questionnaires regarding hospital social service departments’ participation in teaching medical students. Includes questionnaire forms, replies from 24 departments, and evaluations by Eleanor Cockerill, chairman of the committee.
Surveys done of medical school teaching of social and environmental factors in illness.
First draft of the committee’s report.
A Study of the Teaching of Social and Environmental Factors in Medicine,Final report.
Questionnaires re use of current casework methods in teaching medical students and re inter-department relationships.
A casebook of illustrative material demonstrating specific contributions by medical social workers in teaching medical students.
Material used in compiling Medical Social Workers Participate in Medical Education.
This project to secure information regarding concepts covered in medical social work courses was abandoned in 1942. Correspondence and papers.
Correspondence, reports, and scattered course outlines. The material reflects problems of relationships between medical social work and psychiatric social work. The subcommittee studied psychiatric course content in the medical social work curriculum.
The subcommittee did a preliminary survey of recruiting practices and needs in 1940 but declined to undertake an extensive project. It prepared a tentative report in 1941.
The subcommittee attempted to secure and interpret data on medical social workers and to formulate a simplified method for reporting all students completing the medical social work sequence.
Correspondence and reports re teaching aspects of medical social work to nurses. Includes material on medical social work in the nursing curriculum, and nursing in the medical social work curriculum.
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Formerly the subcommittee on teaching of students in hospital administration. Correspondence, minutes, and reports re social work content of the hospital administration curriculum. Includes pilot study of the University of California School of Public Heal
Correspondence and reports regarding matters of common interest to the education committee and AASSW, especially to its curriculum committee: curriculum content, recruitment, professional education, and accrediting of schools of social work. Contains mate
Correspondence re medical social work positions in civil service and the Association’s role in determining standards for such positions.
APHA asked the Association to assist in developing material for civil service merit system examinations in medical social work.
Material re procedure for Association approval of medical social work courses initiated by schools of social work.
Correspondence re a proposed history of medical social work to be done by Ida Cannon.
Correspondence and reports re appointment of Association representatives to CSWE’s subcommittee on teaching materials and the importance of the use of medical social work case records for teaching.
Material re formulating a definition of "full course" which determined eligibility for active membership in AAMSW. The education committee decided in 1946 to allow individual medical social work faculty to define the term.
Medical social work consultants were members of the education committee. Chiefly correspondence re concern for adopting the best of medical social work practice to Army needs.
The committee compiled materials illustrative of medical social work activities in public programs. Includes sample case records and samples of consultation services to state and county health departments .
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In 1944 and 1945 the education committee contacted schools of social work in an attempt to assist OVR in finding medical social workers for state rehabilitation programs. Material re the education committee’s advisory committee to OVR.
One report of a survey of sixteen instructors.
Chiefly reports and memoranda re committee planning for Association exhibits at annual meetings of the American Hospital Association and other organizations.
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Formerly the plans and estimates committee and later the planning and finance committee. Minutes and correspondence of the committee, which had responsibility for long-range financial planning, year-by-year budgeting, and staff administration.
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Report of a study of eight clinics’ placement of convalescing children in foster homes.’
Correspondence and reports. Includes material on the inter-relationship of disease and social maladjustment, the contribution of the social casework method to institutional practice of medicine, the persisting concern of AAMSW for casework method and skil
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Exhibit of Steps in the Study and Definition of the Hospital Social Worker’s function. Exhibit manual which traces the history of the committee on functions, 1920-1930.
Case material for use of instructors which was also used as source material for the publication, Medical Social Work; A Study of Current Aims and Methods in Medical Social Case Work.
Selected Statistics and Study Outlines Includes list of participating social service departments, instructions to participants, plan of publication and plan of presentation of the study, etc.
Selected Statistics and Study Outlines. Material on study projects, 1936-1941 including sample forms, memoranda, etc.
Material regarding the cardiac, pediatrics, and eye and ear clinics.
Material illustrating individual referral cases, orthopedic ward cases, pediatrics cases, and a "full demonstration of a brief case."
Six cases from the diabetes ward.
Material illustrating individual referral and "full demonstration of brief cases.
Mixed (medical) services cases illustrating individual referral and 100 percent contact.
Mixed (medical) services cases.
Eighteen cases, "fully recorded," showing the method of 100 percent social review. Cases from dermatology, eye, surgical, and medical services.
Material regarding ear, nose, and throat cases; medical clinic cases; medical ward cases; pediatrics ward cases; and "full demonstration of brief cases."
Six cases.
Mixed (medical) services cases.
Correspondence re cases sent to AAMSW. Includes evaluation, by Irene Grant, of all cases submitted.
Forty-one "brief cases" from VA hospitals in Hines, Illinois; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Indianapolis, Indiana; Cheyenne, Wyoming; and Hot Springs, South Dakota.
Cases submitted by the District for functions committee projects.
The District appointed a study committee to analyze case records illustrating trends in casework practice. Includes five cases submitted to the Association and a report of the study committee’s analysis.
Cases submitted from the University of Minnesota Hospitals, the Wilder Clinic, Mayo Clinic, and Minneapolis General Hospital.
Case of a diabetic child, illustrating the relationship of disease and social maladjustment.
Cases submitted for Junctions Project C, "full demonstration of a brief case."
The committee considered the expanding need for professional personnel and the Association’s inability to provide it, and the problem of increasing use of non-medical social workers in medical settings.
The Joint Vocational Service was an organization offering "vocational" and placement service to nurses, public health nurses, and social workers.
Correspondence and reports re volunteers.
Correspondence and reports. Includes material on the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA), public relief clients, venereal disease programs, social aspects of expanding medical care programs, and medical social work in tax-supported health and w
The Study was conducted as a joint project of APWA and AAMSW with APWA providing most of the financial support. Includes preliminary report which was never released for circulation.
Contains material re AAMSW’s response to the joint committee’s report, "Hospital Care for the Needy.
Material re formulating a statement submitted by AAMSW to the U.S. Children’s Bureau suggesting qualifications and appropriate activities for medical social workers in state programs for crippled children.
The committee did "Two Studies of the Social Aspects of Health Problems of Public Relief Clients." The studies focused on Cook County, Illinois; and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Correspondence, minutes, and reports. The report of the reorganization committee resulted in placing various Association study committees involved in practice under the practice committee. The committee was concerned with continuous study of medical socia
The subcommittee functioned also as a joint committee with the American Hospital Association1s committee on the administration of social service departments in hospitals. Correspondence; reports; and a statement describing the structure and organization,
Correspondence and reports re the use of case material in classroom teaching.
Correspondence and reports re social and emotional implications of chronic illness for patients, families, and society.
Correspondence and reports re determining of methods of evaluating social service departments.
Correspondence. Concern for definition arose out of the study of the use of non-medical social workers in medical social work positions.
Correspondence and reports re clarification of the role of the medical social worker in rehabilitation programs.
Correspondence, minutes, reports, and interviews with state health department staff members.
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Correspondence and reports.
Reports.
Correspondence and reports, Final report: Administering a Hospital Social Service Department.
Correspondence, minutes, and reports re ratios (defined as the number of medical social workers needed per patient per year).
Reports.
Correspondence and reports. The statement was intended to be a guide in organizing and improving social service departments in hospitals and clinics.
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Correspondence and reports. The subcommittee considered the effects of World War II on practice.
Correspondence, reports, and final statement.
Correspondence, reports, and material re methods of recording in hospital social service departments.
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Correspondence and reports. This subcommittee attempted to define elements in medical social work which might be changing or developing as psychosomatic factors were given increasing recognition in medical practice.
Scattered correspondence.
Correspondence and report, "Working with Other Professional Personnel in the Medical Setting."
The subcommittee was formed out of concern for the trend away from specialization in social work education and its effect on social service departments .
Correspondence re medical social work practice in venereal disease settings. Study to determine the effect, if any, that new medical treatment and new public health organization were having on medical social workers. Includes final reports, "Medical Socia
The practice and education committees cooperated in sending questionnaires to 1948 graduates of medical social work sequences in schools of social work to determine how effectively their education had prepared them for practice. Includes a copy of the que
Correspondence and reports re eligibility for membership, problems of standards in hospital social service departments, analysis of Association membership groups, recruiting, student membership, and establishing and altering membership requirements.
Correspondence and reports.
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The committee was concerned with sound personnel practices both in the field of medical social work and with AAMSW’s national staff. Includes material on hiring, contracts, tenure, hours, physical conditions, and minimum standards. Includes A Statement of
Correspondence and reports.
Correspondence and reports.
The committee’s report recommended similar minimum standards for medical social workers in both hospitals and public health programs. Reflects flux within the profession because of the debate of generic vs. specific social work, the use of non-medical soc
Correspondence and reports re the Association’s concern for establishment of satisfactory qualifications and examinations for medical social work positions under public auspices, and its relations with the Civil Service Assembly.
Correspondence; drafts of the "Place of the Medical Social Work in Civil Defense.
Correspondence, reports, and programs. The committee had responsibility for planning Association participation in the Annual Forum of the National Conference of Social Work, and planning the Association’s annual meeting, which was held in conjunction with
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Correspondence, minutes, and reports. Material on the numbers of members in Association districts and the amount of dues paid by members. The committee was formed in response to criticism of the basis of representation on the Association executive committ
Correspondence, minutes, and reports. Includes material on exhibits and interpretation of medical social work to related professions and to the public.
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A prize was awarded for the article submitted which best interpreted the medical social work function to non-social workers. Includes correspondence and contest articles.
Pamphlets, radio scripts, and lists of films with medical social work implications.
Correspondence and reports. The committee was concerned with recording of "social information" by the hospital social service department and making this information available to other hospital departments.
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Correspondence, minutes, and reports. The committee was responsible- for long-range development of recruitment policies and served as advisor to the recruitment consultant.
The committee was composed of representatives from health, social work, education, and vocational guidance fields.
Pamphlets, leaflets, and brochures.
Reports. Social service committees, composed of representatives from hospital administration, the medical staff, the community, etc., served in an advisory capacity to social service departments.
The committee was appointed by the president in June 1940, to make recommendations regarding reorganization of the Association. Includes preliminary and final reports, and material on functions of standing committees and duties of national staff members.
The committee was established in 1953 as a subcommittee of both the public relations committee and the publications committee (which later became the editorial committee). Later in 1953 the subcommittee became the reprints committee, whose function was to
Correspondence and reports. The committee, which apparently was reactivated after 1944 following a series of scholarship grants from the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, had responsibility for developing a continuous scholarship program.
Correspondence, minutes, and reports re standards to be met by hospital social service departments.
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Correspondence, minutes, and reports re statistical reporting of services to patients by social service departments.
Reports of votes cast for the election of Association officers.
Material re the use of volunteers in medical social work.
Correspondence, minutes, reports, and memoranda. Includes a letter (February 14, 1942) describing conditions in Hawaii after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.
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Material re efforts of the Association to involve its districts and regions in the Office of Civilian Defense’s emergency medical services programs.
Material reflects the concern with problems of the relation of medical social work and war industry.
Material re medical social work participation in resettlement and in programs for Japanese in relocation centers.
Material re concern for new emergency rehabilitation needs, new groups of people seeking services, and the importance of rehabilitation of those not normally "usable" during wartime.
Material re medical needs of rejected draftees.
Material re medical social work in venereal disease programs, clinics, and treatment centers.
Correspondence re collection of material on volunteers.
Correspondence, minutes, and reports dealing generally with the involvement of these associations in various defense or war-related programs: American Association of Schools of Social Work, American Association of Social Workers, American National Red Cro
Correspondence, minutes, and reports dealing generally with Association involvement in and services to the following agencies: Office for Emergency Management, War Manpower Commission; Office of Civilian Defense; Office of Defense, Health and Welfare Serv
Role of medical social workers in UNRRA.
Correspondence, reports, and papers of Kate McMahon, consultant from 1927-1956. Material on the shortage of trained workers, the impact of the Depression, and the quality of medical social work education.
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Correspondence, reports, and papers of Addie Thomas, who was appointed consultant in 1953.
Formal reports of consultation visits to hospitals, medical schools, and Association districts and regions.
Material re social service departments.
Material re the physical lay-out of the social service department.
Material re the organization and general problems of social service departments.
Material re supervision, "recording," and participation in medical education.
Material re statistics and "recording."
Material re "recording."
Correspondence re concern for standards of social service departments.
Correspondence chiefly re arrangements for visit.
Community Services sought to develop a concept of normal practice in a social service department.
Material re social service departments in these hospitals, which were designated for Negro patients.
The Institute was the cancer research center for the New York State Health Department.
The hospital was, in effect, removed from the list of accredited hospitals by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospitals. Material re the controversy about alleged political control of the hospital.
Material re fee-charging in social service departments.
Routine correspondence re proposed trip.
Material re fee-charging, "recording," working with groups of glaucoma patients, and social service departments.
Correspondence and "Social Service Department Anthology," a collection of articles re activities of a social service department in a general hospital.
Correspondence re visits to Region II and to the Gulf and Eastern Canada districts.
Correspondence re planning of the orientation trip.
Correspondence and reports of visits to Louisville, Kentucky; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; and Texas.
Reports of student-supervisor evaluation conferences, case records, medical social work students’ self-evaluations, and case conferences of social work teams.
Correspondence and proceedings of the School of Social Service Administration’s Summer Workshop on Consultation in which Addie Thomas participated
Correspondence and Addie Thomas’ shorthand notes on the Institute on Growth and Development of Children, which was sponsored by the Harvard University School of Public Health and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health.
Correspondence, lists of topics to be discussed and of participants, and Addie Thomas’ shorthand notes.
Addie Thomas led the workshop. Correspondence, minutes, and resource materials.
Correspondence, outlines of program, preliminary materials, study materials, and speeches given at the Institute, which was titled "Social Work Practice in Medical Care and Rehabilitation Settings: Goals, Principles, Techniques and Problems in the Compreh
Correspondence and reports. The Association recruitment program was supported by a National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis grant.
Correspondence and copies of district constitutions and bylaws. Each district drew up its own constitution.
Minutes and reports of the council, which was composed of district chairmen.
Material re Association financing, medical social work personnel, social legislation, membership, procedure for terminating Association business in 1955, and recruiting.
Correspondence, minutes, reports, and financial and membership data.
Correspondence and reports.
Correspondence and reports. Material re training of medical social workers, volunteers, and recruitment. In 1938 the district urged consideration of a merger with the American Association of Social Workers.
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Correspondence, minutes, and reports. Includes material on the effect of World War II, recruitment, and consideration of a merger of district medical social workers with the local chapter of the American Association of Social Workers.
Correspondence and reports. Material on membership problems and recruitment.
Correspondence and reports.
Correspondence and reports. The district was dissolved about 1932.
Correspondence and reports.
Correspondence and reports. Historical material and material on recruitment.
Correspondence and reports. Material on hospital social service in Cleveland (Ohio), civil defense and medical social work, and the Depression.
Correspondence and reports. Material on the history of the district and World War II.
Correspondence and reports. The district petitioned the Association in 1934 to be permitted to dissolve and form two California districts.
Correspondence and reports. Includes material regarding cooperation with the American Association of Social Workers, standards for patient eligibility for county medical care in California, and personnel standards.
Correspondence and reports. Includes material on cooperation with the local American Association of Social Workers.
Correspondence and reports. Includes material on community health, recruitment, and the development of the district.
Correspondence and reports.
Correspondence and reports. The material reflects the problems and procedures of formation of a district.
Correspondence and reports. Material re the formation of a district.
Correspondence and reports.
The region comprised the Hawaiian Islands. Correspondence and reports reflecting problems of organizing and maintaining a functioning region.
The region included all or parts of Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico. Correspondence.
The region included all or parts of Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, and West Virginia. Correspondence and reports.
The region included all or parts of Iowa, Nebraska, and North and South Dakota. Correspondence and reports.
The region included all or parts of Virginia, Georgia, Florida, and North and South Carolina. Correspondence and reports.
Correspondence re Association financial matters.
Brief financial statements submitted annually to the state of Massachusetts.
Tax forms and correspondence re tax-exempt status of the Association and its status in regard to social security, old age insurance, and Washington, D.C., unemployment compensation.
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Correspondence re group sickness and accident plans.
Correspondence, reports, and applications which frequently include discussion of the Association’s program and financial needs. Early financial support came principally from the Russell Sage Foundation.
Material re hiring of secretaries for the section, referral of membership applications to NASW, and memoranda re section organization.
Correspondence and reports re the role of medical social workers in civil defense.
Report of the AHA survey committee and discussion of it by medical social workers; copy of the "Report of the Committee on the Training of Hospital Social Workers of the American Hospital Association," 1922.
Material re approval of medical social work curricula in schools of social work. The accreditation function was transferred in 1950 to the American Association of Schools of Social Work. Includes lists of schools of social work with approved medical socia
Correspondence and forms. Material re enrollment of medical social work students in schools of social work.
Continued from previous box
Includes chart showing the distribution of social service departments in the U.S. and miscellaneous historical statements.
The Association sought legal opinions on the confidentiality of social worker-client relationships, membership dues, procedures for mailing of ballots, and liquidation of the Association.
Correspondence re congressional and state hearings and legislation of interest to the Association. Includes material on hearings on the 1946 National Health Bill.
Correspondence sent to associate members informing them of dissolution of the Association; to emeritus and honorary members elected at the June 1955 meeting.
Obituaries of Association members or material on honors awarded them. Includes material on Edna G. Henry, Ruth Lewis, Mary E. Wadley, Elizabeth E. Payne, Agnes H. Schroeder, Edith M. Baker, Ida M. Cannon, and Garnet I. Pelton.
After Miss Goldstine1s death, a fund was set up to commemorate her work through a series of University of Chicago lectures. Correspondence re contributions.
Job descriptions for the following positions: executive director; president; first vice-president; business manager; consultants on education, practice, and recruitment; and secretary to the recruitment consultant. Includes forms for clerical positions.
Association policies regarding personnel, business practice, and travel.
Correspondence and statement of policy. Includes report of the Association representative to the 1949 American Association of Social Workers’ delegate conference.
Includes statements of the function, objectives, and program of the Association; material on the relation of AAMSW to other associations; and a "Summary of Program of the American Association of Medical Social Workers, 1952-1954, and Projected Program to
Correspondence and reports of salary studies of medical and other social workers.
Legal-length items separated from previous folder
Correspondence and reports. Material on Association participation in revision of The Cerebral-Palsied Child and His Care in the Home, a book published by the Association for Aid to Crippled Children.
Chiefly inquiries addressed to the Association re policy of hospital social service departments charging fees.
Correspondence and report, "A Method of Determining the Number of Medical Social Workers Needed for Case Work in a General Hospital.
Material on case loads and reporting of statistics.
In 1928 the Association sought the advice of nine organizations re the advisibility of making surveys of social service departments to determine how to improve standards, conditions, etc.
Report of an unidentified committee.
Minutes of an informal committee meeting on the relationship of national organizations interested in social casework. Ida M. Cannon represented the Association.
Correspondence, minutes, and reports.
The committee was composed of members of national agencies, including AAMSW, and functioned under the auspices of AASSW.
Minutes of a meeting of "concerned" professional social work organizations with AASSW1s committee to discuss implications of federal legislation affecting civil service classification.
Material re revision of manual used by ACS to rate hospitals. The Association revised the section on social service departments.
Correspondence re Association representation on the Council.
Correspondence re relations between the two associations. Includes material about a study of hospital care of chronic alcoholics conducted by AHA in 1943.
Correspondence and reports. Includes material on the function of medical social workers in public health and public medical care programs.
Correspondence re the California Association’s offer of money for medical social work scholarships. AAMSW was concerned about the implications of accepting money from this collecting agency.
The Commission was a private "public service committee" studying hospital service in the U.S. Includes report of the Association president to the executive committee re the work of the Commission.
Report on the development and status of medical social work prepared for the committee by AAMSW.
Correspondence, minutes, and reports. Material on the Ernest Hollis-Alice Taylor study of social work education (the Hollis-Taylor Study); the formation of CSWE from the National Council on Social Work Education and the American Association of Schools of
Material issued by the Commission, which based its accreditation on hospital structure, organization, and facilities.
Correspondence, minutes, and reports. Formerly the Wartime Committee on Personnel. The committee, which was affiliated with the American Association of Social Workers, began as an inter-association committee to increase the supply of trained social work p
This inter-association committee, of which AAMSW was a member, represented the social work profession to the national defense program. Correspondence and reports.
Correspondence and reports re rehabilitation of the handicapped. AAMSW withdrew from representation on the Council in 1949.
Correspondence, applications, and reports. The grants, which were intended to "support the educational program" of the Association, were used to provide consultation services to schools of social work and medicine and services to the field of practice in
NFIP granted $3,000 to the Association to reorganize its office files.
Correspondence and material re grants.
Brief routine correspondence.
Correspondence re Association participation in NHC, especially in a Health Careers Project.
Report of an NRA conference by an Association representative.
Correspondence and reports re the function and program of NSWA.
The Conference was established in 1940 as the Social Case Work Council of National Agencies to consider problems and opportunities of national agencies in regard to industries, refugee travel, alien registration, and military concentration. Includes mater
Requests for information on research studies related to casework practice.
Material re the Bureau’s review of its function of counselling and placement.
Correspondence and reports. When the American National Red Cross transferred its casework program to the Army, the Association provided consultants to assist in incorporating these services into the Army program.
Correspondence about these traineeships established for medical social workers by the National Institute.
The Association provided information on medical social work for the Commission.’
Correspondence, reports, and memoranda re the personnel situation in social work. Includes a preliminary draft of the Public Health Service Health Manpower Source Book.
Correspondence re the Association’s efforts to cooperate with OVR, which expanded its programs following the Vocational Rehabilitation Act Amendments of 1943- Includes material re the availability of rehabilitation training grants under the Vocational Reh
Reports of institutes and conferences re development of social work in medical institutions, administration of hospitals, community health needs, community organization, etc.
Proceedings of the workshop on social workers’ collaboration in multi-discipline programs.’
Correspondence re termination of publication after 1955.
Scattered correspondence, clippings, and exhibit material. Includes photographs of Edna G. Henry, Mary L. Hemmy, Opal Gooden, Agnes H. Schroeder, and participants in the 1931 annual meeting of the Association.
Continued from previous box
Correspondence, requests for information, and other material re studies conducted by individuals and organizations. Includes material on clinic admissions; study of dues, income, and expenses of various national associations; private nursing homes in Monr
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: Established in 1919 as the National Association of Visiting Teachers and Home Visitors; after several name changes, it became the National Association of School Social Workers in 1945. The organization's purpose was to define the role of school social workers, advance the quality of social service in public and private schools, and improve standards of training. In 1955 the NASSA merged with six other organizations to form the National Association of Social Workers.
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: Begun in 1922 as the Section on Psychiatric Social Work of the American Association of Hospital Social Workers and organized as an independent organization, the AAPSW, in 1926, the organization sought to define and set standards for social work practiced in connection with psychiatry. The AAPSW was one of seven organizations that merged in 1955 to form the National Association of Social Workers.
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: Organized in 1936 as the National Association for the Study of Group Work and reorganized as the American Association of Group Workers in 1946, the organization sought to define and promote higher professional standards for social work with groups. Most of its members were employed by settlement houses, YMCAs and YWCAs, and recreation and camping organizations. The AAGW was one of seven organizations that merged in 1955 to form the National Association of Social Workers.
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: Formed in 1946 and incorporated in 1947, ASCO sought to increase understanding and improve professional practice of community organization for social welfare. It differed from other professional social work organizations in that it accepted educators and other non-social workers as members. The ASCO was one of seven organizations that merged in 1955 to form the National Association of Social Workers.
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: Established in 1949 to provide a means of communication and to further the development of research within the social work profession. The SWRG was one of seven organizations that merged in 1955 to form the National Association of Social Workers.
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: Originated informally in 1947 as the Committee on Inter-Association Structure of Professional Organizations in Social Work by five professional social work associations to promote better cooperation and coordination among the associations. The TIAC was formed in 1950 to work toward a single, unified professional membership organization. The seven participating associations merged in 1955 to form the National Association of Social Workers.
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: Created in 1950 by five national professional social work associations to address the need for maximum concentration of social work services during the Korean War period. The committee disbanded in 1955 when its functions were assumed by the newly-formed National Association of Social Workers.
HISTORICAL SUMMARY: The National Association of Social Workers (NASW) was established in October, 1955, following five years of careful planning by the Temporary Inter-Association Council (TIAC). Seven organizations – American Association of Social Workers (AASW), American Association of Medical Social Workers (AAMSW), National Association of School Social Workers (NASSW), American Association of Psychiatric Social Workers (AAPSW), American Association of Group Workers UAW Association for the Study of Community Organization (ASCO), and Social Work Research Group (SWRG) – merged to form the NASW.