Scope and Content Note
The records of the Frontier Nursing Service, Washington Committee, span the years 1976 to 1994, with the bulk of the material dating from 1981 to 1994. Correspondence, minutes, membership rosters, invitations, and other printed matter document the fund-raising activities of the Washington Committee of the Frontier Nursing Service. Founded in 1925 by Mary Breckinridge as the Kentucky Committee for Mothers and Babies, three years later the organization became the Frontier Nursing Service. The mission of the organization is to provide family-centered care to its patients in and around rural Leslie County, Kentucky, as well as the United States and the world, through the efforts of its graduates from the Frontier School of Midwifery and Family Nursing. The Washington Committee held various fund-raising events, especially the Kentucky Derby Day Party held annually at the home of the honorary national chairman and a cousin of Mary Breckinridge, Mary Marvin Breckinridge Patterson.