Ancker Nurses Alumni Association.

In order to get a complete history of the Ancker Nurses Alumni Association it is necessary to know something about the hospital which sponsored the nursing school, the nursing school itself, and finally something of the history of the alumni association. In 1872, the Ramsey County board of control (later called the county commissioners) authorized the purchase of a 10-room mansion from Dr. Stewart, one of the city's foremost doctors and three-time mayor, and officially established City and County Hospital in that mansion in 1873. Drs. Stewart and Charles Wheaton ran the hospital until August 1883, when the board elected Dr. Arthur B. Ancker hospital superintendent, a position he would hold for forty years. During his tenure Ancker was able to expand hospital facilities and services several-fold so that by the early 1920s City and County Hospital was one of the largest hospitals in the country. The hospital was renamed the Arthur B. Ancker Memorial Hospital in his honor after his death in 1923. The hospital saw five superintendents over the next 44 years with Dr. Fred Carter (1925-1935) and Dr. Thomas Broadie (1936-1967) having the longest tenures. In October 1965, a new nine-story hospital was built on the Jackson Street and University Avenue intersection northeast of downtown St. Paul, the West Seventh Street location abandoned (eventually taken over by the St. Paul school district), and the hospital renamed St. Paul-Ramsey Hospital. In 1977, the Gillette Hospital for Crippled Children moved out of their outdated facilities near Lake Phalen and into a new building on the St. Paul-Ramsey campus. That hospital was renamed Gillette Children's Hospital and the entire complex renamed to the St. Paul-Ramsey Medical Center, to reflect the expansion of services, even though the two hospitals remained operationally independent. In 1986 the St. Paul-Ramsey Hospital became a private, nonprofit facility no longer overseen by Ramsey County. A year later the hospital, clinic, and foundation were consolidated under common management. In September 1997 the complex became known as Regions Hospital.

The nursing school was established in 1891 as a two-year program, had its first graduate in 1893, and trained nurses for another 83 years until 1976, when its last class graduated. Training became a three-year program in 1902, and a separate nurses cottage was constructed in 1905. More than 2,600 nurses graduated from the Ancker School of Nursing. Mrs. Frances D. Campbell was supervisor of nursing education from 1900 to 1928, followed by Delphine Hines (1929-1933), Elizabeth Reynolds (1934-1946), Etta Lubberts (1947-1965), Minna Moehring (1966-1973), and Charlotte Tracy (1974-1976). The school accepted its first male students in 1968. Despite name changes to the hospital, the nursing school remained the Arthur B. Ancker Memorial School of Nursing until its close.

The Ancker Nurses Alumni Association was established in 1904, incorporated in 1935, and continued through 1999, 23 years after the last class graduated. Among the activities conducted by the alumni association were teas for the graduating class, sponsorsing of scholarships for student nurses and for continuing education of professional nurses, sponsorship of educational seminars, and hosting of an all-class homecoming every five years.

From the guide to the Association records., 1897-1999., (Minnesota Historical Society)