For All Children Everywhere: Childrens Mercy Kansas City - 1897-2017

On the eve of the 20th century, two sisters, each with a big heart and an indomitable will, set out to care for Kansas City s neediest children. They began with one little girl. Then they helped a couple more children, and then a dozen and then scores and hundreds of victims of abuse, birth defects, accidents and illness. With no help from public subsidies or insurers, they treated all comers with any hope of recovery but only as long as their patients were too poor to pay. That s how Alice Berry Graham and Katharine Berry Richardson started an institution that has grown into a part of the soul of Kansas City: Children s Mercy. For All Children Everywhere is a story of unending love and persistence on the part of two sisters, of the people who followed them and of the community that took their mission to heart. Today, 12 decades aft er its humble start as The Hospital of the Little People, Children s Mercy still brings healing to the poor, but also hope to all children and families of the city and the region. About the book s title: The founders of Children s Mercy declared their hospital to be for children regardless of their address, their religion or their pocketbooks. In the 1920s, when racial segregation ruled in public life, the leaders of the hospital believed they needed to address the health needs of non-white children, too. They found a way to work toward that goal, and declared the hospital For All Children Everywhere.