"Ever since she was a little girl, Jane Addams hoped to help people in need. She wanted to create a place where people could find food, work, and community. In 1889, she chose a house in a run-down Chicago neighborhood and turned it into Hull House--a settlement home--soon adding a playground, kindergarten, and a public bath, By 1907, Hull House included thirteen buildings. And by the early 1920s, more than nine thousand people visited Hull House each week. The dreams of a smart, caring girl had become a reality. And the lives of hundreds of thousands of people were transformed when they stepped into the house that Jane Addams built."--Provided by publisher.

A biography of the woman who founded Hull-House, one of the first settlement houses in the United States, and who later became involved in the international peace movement.

An inspiring picture book biography of Jane Addams, the groundbreaking social activist who went from the FBI's "Most Dangerous Woman in America" to Nobel Peace Prize winner. From the time she was a child, Jane Addams's heart ached for others—for those who were sad, hungry, and hopeless. When she grew up, Jane created Hull House, a settlement house in Chicago where she worked eighteen hours a day, providing whatever her immigrant neighbors needed: English lessons, childcare, steady work—as well as friendship, dignity, and hope. Then World War I broke out. Jane had helped people from different countries live in peace at Hull House, but what could she do to stop a war? Suzanne Slade's powerful free verse and Alice Ratterree's stunning, period-perfect illustrations bring a remarkable woman to life.

A history of Hull House and the many social reforms it inspired serve as a background to a biography of the woman who dedicated her life to improving society.

Jane Addams was the first American woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. Now Citizen, Louise W. Knight's masterful biography, reveals Addams's early development as a political activist and social philosopher. In this book we observe a powerful mind grappling with the radical ideas of her age, most notably the ever-changing meanings of democracy. Citizen covers the first half of Addams's life, from 1860 to 1899. Knight recounts how Addams, a child of a wealthy family in rural northern Illinois, longed for a life of larger purpose. She broadened her horizons through education, reading, and travel, and, after receiving an inheritance upon her father's death, moved to Chicago in 1889 to co-found Hull House, the city's first settlement house. Citizen shows vividly what the settlement house actually was—a neighborhood center for education and social gatherings—and describes how Addams learned of the abject working conditions in American factories, the unchecked power wielded by employers, the impact of corrupt local politics on city services, and the intolerable limits placed on women by their lack of voting rights. These experiences, Knight makes clear, transformed Addams. Always a believer in democracy as an abstraction, Addams came to understand that this national ideal was also a life philosophy and a mandate for civic activism by all. As her story unfolds, Knight astutely captures the enigmatic Addams's compassionate personality as well as her flawed human side. Written in a strong narrative voice, Citizen is an insightful portrait of the formative years of a great American leader. “Knight’s decision to focus on Addams’s early years is a stroke of genius. We know a great deal about Jane Addams the public figure. We know relatively little about how she made the transition from the 19th century to the 20th. In Knight’s book, Jane Addams comes to life. . . . Citizen is written neither to make money nor to gain academic tenure; it is a gift, meant to enlighten and improve. Jane Addams would have understood.”—Alan Wolfe, New York Times Book Review “My only complaint about the book is that there wasn’t more of it. . . . Knight honors Addams as an American original.”—Kathleen Dalton, Chicago Tribune

"Excellent. . . . The Education of Jane Addams provides a detailed, wonderfully complex analysis of Addams's ideas, life, and work."--Journal of American History

As one of the four members of the inner circle at Hull-House, Julia Lathrop played an instrumental role in the field of social reform for more than fifty years. Working tirelessly for women, children, immigrants and workers, she was the first head of the federal Children's Bureau, an ardent advocate of woman suffrage, and a cultural leader. She was also one of Jane Addams's best friends. My Friend, Julia Lathrop is Addams' lovingly rendered biography of a memorable colleague and confidant. The memoir reveals a great deal about the influence of Hull-House on the social and political history of the early twentieth century. An introduction by long-time Addams scholar Anne Firor Scott provides a broader account of women's work in voluntary associations.