Henry Street Settlement: The Birthplace of Visiting Nursing

Why is it significant?

Pause before the dignified trio of red-brick Greek Revival rowhouses at two hundred sixty-three through two hundred sixty-seven Henry Street.

Key Facts

Open the walk

Pause before the dignified trio of red-brick Greek Revival rowhouses at two hundred sixty-three through two hundred sixty-seven Henry Street. With their wrought-iron balconies, welcoming stoops, and graceful white porticos, these historic residences dating from the eighteen thirties look like an oasis of domestic gentility. Yet behind these modest wooden doors began one of the most revolutionary social welfare movements in American history, dedicated to bringing medical care, education, and social justice to the poorest tenements in New York.

In eighteen ninety-three, pioneering nurse and social reformer Lillian Wald was horrified by the squalid, untreated illnesses she witnessed in neighborhood tenements, where typhus and tuberculosis raged unchecked. Backed by philanthropist Jacob Schiff, Wald established the Nurses' Settlement here, sending trained public health nurses directly into immigrant homes on foot and across tenement rooftops. Her revolutionary initiative gave birth to the Visiting Nurse Service of New York, providing affordable healthcare regardless of a patient's race, creed, or ability to pay. Wald's team of pioneering nurses climbed across icy tenement roofs and navigated precarious fire escapes with their heavy medical bags in hand, providing compassionate bedside care to hundreds of thousands of impoverished immigrants during devastating influenza epidemics.

The settlement quickly expanded far beyond healthcare: Wald founded the Neighborhood Playhouse in nineteen fifteen right next door, pioneering modern community theater and staging early works by Eugene O'Neill, Martha Graham, and George Gershwin.

Notice the peaceful brick garden courtyard tucked behind the main building: here, neighborhood children who had never seen grass or trees found safe haven from the crowded cobblestone alleys. Neighbors knew they could knock on the settlement door day or night to receive compassionate help in times of dire need.

Head northwest toward the bustling hub of Seward Park and the historic Educational Alliance building on East Broadway.