Mary Ellen Richmond

Social worker

• Born: August 5, 1861
• Birthplace: Belleville, Illinois
• Died: September 12, 1928
• Place of death: New York, New York

Education: Eastern Female High School

Significance: Mary Ellen Richmond is considered a pioneer in modern American social work. Richmond was one of the first people to enact standards for educational training for caseworkers. She also authored a number of books on social work, including Social Diagnosis (1917), which is thought by many to be her most important work.

Early Life

Mary Ellen Richmond was born on August 5, 1861, in Belleville, Illinois. Her father, Henry Richmond, was a carriage blacksmith, and he was married to Lavinia Harris. The couple had four children, but Richmond was the only one to live to adulthood. When Richmond was young, the family moved to Baltimore, Maryland.

Richmond lost her mother when she was three. Her father remarried, but he died when she was just seven years old. Richmond then lived with her grandmother and two of her aunts. Her grandmother ran a boarding house, where Richmond was exposed to "radical" ideas concerning racial justice and women's voting rights.

Richmond's grandmother taught her at home until Richmond began attending grammar school at age eleven. She then attended Eastern Female High School in Baltimore, from which she graduated at the age of sixteen. After graduating from high school, Richmond, along with one of her aunts, moved to New York, where they both worked at a publishing house in clerical positions. The hours were long, the pay was minimal, and the work itself was not intellectually stimulating. In her spare time, Richmond attended lectures at churches and taught herself shorthand. After coming down with a case of malaria in 1880, Richmond returned to her family in Baltimore to recover.

Richmond found a job as a bookkeeper for a stationer, and then she took a job as an office assistant and bookkeeper for a local Baltimore hotel. Still, she was not pleased with the work, and she was looking for something more interesting. Around 1889, Richmond responded to an ad from the Baltimore Charity Organization Society (BCOS) for a position for an assistant treasurer. Although she had no experience and the job did not pay much more than her current job did, Richmond took the position.

Life's Work

During Richmond's time, social work was not a recognized profession. Many aid organizations were designed to protect wealthy donors and determine which poor citizens were actually "worthy" of the aid such charities provided. Many of these organizations had "friendly" volunteer visitors whose job it was to get to know people in need and determine if they were worthy of assistance or if they were trying to scam the organization.

At first, Richmond followed much of the BCOS's rules and even volunteered as a friendly visitor in her spare time. In 1891, she was promoted from assistant to general treasurer for the organization. However, over time, Richmond began to realize that friendly visitors to needy families required some actual training. Initially, she gave BCOS volunteers some informal classes and made them a manual to follow. Through this type of work, Richmond began to reimagine the role of friendly visitors. She started to think of visitors as caseworkers whose true job was to get to know people in need to best determine how to help them. She also believed that it was important to make these positions paid rather than volunteer. Many experts believe that this was the first step toward making social work a true profession in the United States.

In 1899, Richmond began teaching a class in applied philanthropy for the New York Charity Organization Society. That same year, she published her first book, Friendly Visiting among the Poor. By 1900, Richmond had decided to leave the BCOS to take a position with the Society for Organizing Charity in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She served as the general secretary, and she worked to organize the institution's efforts. During her time in Philadelphia, Richmond tried to help pass legislation to protect abandoned wives and child laborers. In 1905, she also became the editor of the Field Department of Charities magazine, a position that helped raise her national profile as a pioneer in the growing field of social work. Two years later, she published her second book, The Good Neighbor in the Modern City.

Richmond stayed in her position in Philadelphia until 1909, when she left to work as the director of the Charity Organization Department at New York City's Russell Sage Foundation. During her time with the foundation, she began to collect data to help develop professional standards for charities and social workers. She also started to examine cases to create the principles for her 1917 book, Social Diagnosis. The idea behind this text, considered Richmond's finest, was that diagnosis of a problem was necessary for social workers to determine how best to assist clients. The first principle being that work would focus on care of individuals within their particular situations. Social Diagnosis discussed social work theory and provided practical resources for caseworkers.

During the 1910s and into the early 1920s, Richmond taught principles of social work at various schools and summer programs. She was a charter member of the American Association of Social Workers in 1920, and she was presented with an honorary master's degree by Smith College for her dedication to social work in 1921. In 1922, Richmond published What Is Social Casework? In this book, Richmond focused on the importance of social work to both clients in need and the social workers themselves.

Richmond's final books investigated marital laws and practices.

Impact

Richmond is credited with turning social work in the United States into a recognized profession. Her efforts influenced not only social workers in the United States, but also those in the United Kingdom and other countries. Richmond remains a major influence on modern social work and the duties of caseworkers.

Personal Life

Richmond remained single throughout her life. She worked until her death at her home in New York on September 12, 1928.

Principal Works: Nonfiction

• Friendly Visiting among the Poor, 1899
• The Good Neighbor in the Modern City,1907
• A Study of Nine Hundred and Eighty-Five Widows Known to Certain Charity Organization Societies in 1910, 1913
• Social Diagnosis, 1917
• What Is Social Casework?, 1922
• Child Marriages, 1925
• Marriage and the State, 1929

Bibliography

Agnew, Elizabeth N. From Charity to Social Work: Mary E. Richmond and the Creation of an American Profession. U of Illinois P, 2004.

"Mary Ellen Richmond (1861–1928)." National Association of Social Workers, www.naswfoundation.org/pioneers/r/richmond.html. Accessed 5 Feb. 2018.

Matt, Susan J. "Richmond, Mary E. (1861–1928)." Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia, edited by Anne Commire, vol. 13, Yorkin Publications, 2002, pp. 286–89.

Rasmussen, Frederick N. "Richmond Was a Pioneer in Social Work Nationally." Baltimore Sun, 17 Mar. 2001, articles.baltimoresun.com/2001-03-17/features/0103170131‗1‗charity-organization-society-social-workers-society-of-baltimore. Accessed 5 Feb. 2018.

Steyaert, Jan. "Mary Ellen Richmond: The Founding Mother of Social Casework." History of Social Work, Apr. 2013, www.historyofsocialwork.org/eng/details.php?cps=7. Accessed 5 Feb. 2018.