Cabaniss, Sadie Heath, 1865-1921

Sadie Heath Cabaniss, daughter of Charles J. and Virginia R. Cabaniss, was born in Petersburg, Virginia on 9 October 1865. She received a classical education at home before attending St. Timothy's School in Catonsville, Maryland where she graduated in 1874. Following a brief time as governess and teacher, Cabaniss attended the Johns Hopkins Hospital School of Nursing in Baltimore, Maryland. While at Hopkins Cabaniss became acquainted with Isabel Hampton Robb. Upon graduation in 1893, Cabaniss held the position of night supervisor at the Johns Hopkins Hospital

In 1895, Cabaniss became supervisor of the operating room at the Old Dominion Hospital connected to the Medical College of Virginia (MCV) in Richmond, Virginia. The MCV faculty asked Cabaniess to organize a training school for nurses. Cabaniss ran the school she organized on the Nightingale method of nursing education from 1895 until April of 1901.

To respond to the needs of the sick poor in Richmond, Cabaniss and several of her former students from the Old Dominion Training School organized the Nurses' Settlement of Richmond in 1900. The group subsequently evolved into the Instructive Visiting Nurses Association (IVNA).

Following the creation of the Nurses' Settlement, Cabaniess focues on the organization of trained nurses. She urged the formation of alumnea associations as various schools across the Commonwealth and in 1901 called members of the various associations to Richmond to organize the Virginia State Association of Nurses (now the Virginia Nurses Association) Cabaniss served as the first President and continued in the office until 1905. While serving as President, Cabaniss led the movement to secure licensing legislation to regulate nursing in Virginia

Later in life, Cabaniss continued her work in public health in Florida, Georgia and North Carolina. She returned to Virginia following World War I and worked in Virginia's northern neck area. Poor health forced her to retire from nursing work. Cabaniss died in Richmond on 11 July 1921.

For additional biographical information see Sadie Heath Cabaniss in Dictionary of American Nursing Biography 1988 and Sadie Heath Cabaniss in Dictionary of Virginia Biography 2001.

From the guide to the Sadie Heath Cabaniss Letters, 1900-1904, (Special Collections and Archives, Tompkins-McCaw Library)