A graduate nurse's cap; consists of a circular centre area meant to sit on the head, with a large outside edge with a black stripe across it; made out of a gauze-like material.
A graduate nurse's cap; consists of a circular centre area meant to sit on the head, with a large outside edge with a black stripe across it; made out of a gauze-like material.
Number Of Parts
1
Provenance
Cora Burnside's graduation cap, Kingston General Hospital School of Nursing Class of 1923.
Canadian Museum of History, "Symbol of a Profession: One Hundred Years of Nurses' Caps," https://www.historymuseum.ca/cmc/exhibitions/hist/infirm/inint01e.html
"For Service to Humanity: Nursing Education at Kingston General Hospital," Museum of Health Care. https://www.museumofhealthcare.ca/explore/exhibitions/forservicetohumanity.html
Research Facts
Cora Frances Burnside was a graduate of Kingston General Hospital School of Nursing's class of 1923; she probably wore this cap in New York, where she worked until 1971; she died in 1996.
Throughout the twentieth century, nurses' uniforms changed, in particular with the rising of hemlines. The nurse's uniform was generally white, and Kingston General Hospital uniforms were once known for "turkey red" hemlines. Different levels of nursing education had different uniforms, in particular different caps, as graduate nurses had black bands on their caps to indicate their level of education.
Nurses' caps in Canada changed and evolved over the years, with caps resembling a nun's coif used by military Nursing Sisters and as a reminder of Roman Catholic nursing tradition. Older nurses' caps were styled similarly to caps that female domestic servants wore, and were made to cover the head and keep hair neat. These evolved into highly starched symbolic nurses' caps which perched on the top or near the back of the head. Nurses' caps were white, and usually cut from a flat pattern that could be folded and unfolded for starching and cleaning. The nurse's cap began to disappear in the 1970s as nursing education moved from hospitals to colleges and nurses wanted to be identified more closely with doctors and other medical professionals who wore no uniform.