American educator and caregiver
Ethel Harpst
|
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Born
| (
1883-10-27
)
October 27, 1883
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Died
| January 12, 1967
(1967-01-12)
(aged 83)
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Resting place
| Greenwood Cemetery
Cedartown, Georgia
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Nationality
| American
|
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Occupation
| Educator
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Ethel Elizabeth Harpst
(October 27, 1883 ? January 12, 1967) was an American educator, caregiver, and founder of the
Harpst House
in
Cedartown
,
Georgia
.
She moved from
Boaz, Alabama
[1]
to
Cedartown, Georgia
, then a mill village, in 1914 after being appointed to serve in the town's
Goodyear Mill Village
by the
Methodist
Women's Home Missionary Society
, replacing
Bertha Addington
.
[2]
[3]
Harpst cared for the sick in Cedartown, which was in the midst of outbreaks of
scarlet fever
,
typhoid fever
,
influenza
, and
tuberculosis
.
[4]
[5]
She also was a teacher, giving classes on how to
read
and
write
. Her activities were based out of the
Deborah McCarty Settlement House
,
[6]
[7]
which was modeled after
Jane Addams
's and
Ellen Gates Starr
's
Hull House
in
Chicago
.
Harpst established the
Harpst Home
in March 1924, which had been purchased, renovated, and given to Harpst by Cedartown
city clerk
J. C. Walker.
[5]
Located on Bradford Hill, the home quickly needed to be expanded, and Harpst traveled to raise funds for this purpose. In 1927 James Hall was constructed; at the time this three-story brick building was the tallest in Cedartown.
[8]
[1]
The
Great Depression
caused even more strain on the still-growing Harpst Home. A new boys' dorm was opened in 1933. Through Harpst's relentless fundraising and with the assistance of
New York City
couple
Henry Pfeiffer
and
Annie Merner Pfeiffer
,
[9]
the home expanded over the next twenty years, adding more buildings and acquiring hundreds of acres of land.
[8]
The work at the Settlement goes on with night school, day nursery, clinics, classes for men, women, boys, and girls, visiting the sick, comforting the sorrowing, and many other things "too numerous to mention."
Ethel Harpst,
The Woman's Home Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, Forty-Fifth Annual Report for the Year 1925?1926
In 1984, the Women's Division of the
United Methodist Church
combined the Harpst Home with the
Sarah Murphy Home
to create the
Murphy-Harpst Children's Centers
in Cedartown.
[7]
Murphy-Harpst continues to operate to this day, helping care for hundreds of abused children in partnership with the
Georgia Department of Family and Children's Services
and the
Georgia Department of Juvenile Justice
.
[5]
Harpst retired in 1951 at the age of 68.
She was awarded the
Good Neighbor Orchid Award
in 1948 in an appearance on the
radio show
Breakfast in Hollywood
. In 2012 she was inducted into the
Georgia Women of Achievement
Hall of Fame.
[8]
[10]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
Miller, Mildred Perry (March 24, 2008).
"Memories Of A Children's Home"
.
The Chattanoogan
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
- ^
Jackson, Floyd; Cooper, W. C. (1951).
"History of Anna Kresge Memorial Methodist Church"
(PDF)
.
Archived
(PDF)
from the original on 24 July 2019
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
- ^
Brett, Jennifer (March 21, 2018).
"Murphy-Harpst Children's Centers: Two women's legacies live on"
.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
- ^
"Ethel Harpst honored ? Her legacy is the Methodist Murphy-Harpst Children's Center"
. Rome News-Tribune. July 28, 2012
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
- ^
a
b
c
"History"
.
Murphy-Harpst Children's Centers
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
- ^
"The Woman's Home Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, Forty-Fifth Annual Report for the Year 1925-1926"
. The Woman's Home Missionary Society, Methodist Episcopal Church. 1926
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
- ^
a
b
Brackin, Ansley (June 1, 2015).
"Building Bonds at Murphy-Harpst"
.
United Methodist Women
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
- ^
a
b
c
"Ethel Harpst"
.
Georgia Women of Achievement
. 2012
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
- ^
Mercer, Holly A. (October 1998).
"Guide to the Pfeiffer-Merner Family Collection"
.
G.A. Pfeiffer Library
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
- ^
"Senate Resolution 1082"
(PDF)
. Georgia State Senate
. Retrieved
24 July
2019
.
External links
[
edit
]
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