Six Remarkable Hull-House Women

Industrialization, an influx of immigrant labor, and the spread of city slums, together with a lack of opportunity for the first generation of college women, contributed to the rise of social settlements. Hull-House brought help and hope to impoverished workers, while providing employment for residents through such services as a kindergarten, evening classes, music school, and gymnasium. Confronted with the harsh living conditions of neighboring women and children, settlement reformers turned first to the city, then to state and federal legislatures. No more admirable women could have been assembled in the struggle for social justice than the six of Jane Addams, Julia Lathrop, Florence Kelley, Alice Hamilton, and Grace and Edith Abbott.