Mary Noel Arrowsmith

Mary Noel Arrowsmith (May 28, 1890 – October 7, 1965) was an American educator who was awarded a Croix de Guerre for her work with YMCA in France during World War I. Later she was active in promoting safety education and in the peace movement. She also served on the national staff of the YWCA.

Mary Noel Arrowsmith
A white woman, smiling, in a brimmed hat, jacket, shirt, necktie
Mary Noel Arrowsmith, from a 1919 publication.
BornMay 28, 1890
DiedOctober 7, 1965

Early life

Mary Noel Arrowsmith was born May 28, 1890, in Connecticut, the daughter of Harold Arrowsmith and Helen Fleming Smith Arrowsmith.[1][2] Her father was an Episcopal clergyman.[3] She graduated from Smith College in 1913.[4] At Smith, she wrote about Hinduism, and wrote poetry, for the college magazine.[5][6]

World War I
A group of men approach two women, all in uniform. One of the women is holding a basket and the other a box. They are outdoors, and there are tent ropes visible in the image.
Mary Noel Arrowsmith (holding basket) and Gertrude Sumner Ely (holding box), at a field hospital in France, 1918.

During World War I, Arrowsmith worked with YMCA in France in 1918, running a canteen near the front, alongside Gertrude Sumner Ely of Philadelphia.[7] She was awarded the Croix de Guerre for her "great spirit of duty and ability when in danger."[8] She shared a place of honor in a 1919 parade in New York, with fellow YMCA war workers Ely, Frances Gulick, Ethel Creighton Torrance, and Marjorie Skelding.[9]

Career

Education

After the war, Arrowsmith was an education specialist, who published several articles in the Teachers College Record and other professional journals in the 1920s.[10] She was assistant secretary of the education section of the National Safety Council in 1923 and 1924,[11][12] which involved visiting local school districts to consult on safety education curricula.[13] "Safety education does three things," she explained: "First it makes the child alive to the dangers with which complex modern life surrounds him and skilful in combating them. Second, it helps to form safety habits which will protect him throughout his life. Third, it awakes in the child a sense of the value and preciousness of human life and his responsibility in keeping himself sound and whole, and in making his home, his school, and his community a safe place to live in."[14]

YWCA, peace, and human rights

Arrowsmith served on the national standards study commission of the YWCA in 1940.[15] She was secretary for international education on the YWCA's national staff during World War II.[16][17]

In 1928, Arrowsmith wrote an article for The Nation titled "Irredentism in Hungary."[18] She was a member of the Commission to Study the Organization of Peace, headed by James T. Shotwell, and signed the commission's 1944 statement titled "International Safeguard of Human Rights."[19] She wrote "Are the United Nations Moving Toward a Governed World?", a leaflet published by the National Peace Conference.[20]

References
  1. Banta, Theodore Melvin (1901). Sayre Family: Lineage of Thomas Sayre, a Founder of Southampton. De Vinne Press. pp. 371. Mary Noel Arrowsmith.
  2. "Mrs. Arrowsmith, Minister's Widow". The Brooklyn Daily Eagle. November 30, 1950. p. 15. Retrieved September 16, 2019 – via Newspapers.com.
  3. "Rev. Harold Arrowsmith Dies". The Brooklyn Daily Eagle. September 16, 1918. p. 2. Retrieved September 16, 2019 – via Newspapers.com.
  4. "By the Alumnae". Smith Alumnae Quarterly: 115. February 1942.
  5. Arrowsmith, Mary Noel (December 1912). "The Nature of Brahma and His Relation to the Universe". Smith College Monthly. 20: 151–152 – via Internet Archive.
  6. Arrowsmith, Mary Noel (January 1913). "To the Libe". Smith College Monthly. 20: 240.
  7. Mayo, Katherine (1920). "That damn Y": A record of overseas service. University of California Libraries. Boston : Houghton. pp. 110, 124–125, 267.
  8. "Miss Arrowsmith Wins War Cross from Petain". New-York Tribune. May 29, 1919. p. 9. Retrieved September 16, 2019 – via Newspapers.com.
  9. Stevenson, Fay (September 10, 1919). "Five Women in the Big Parade Today". The Evening World. p. 18. Retrieved September 16, 2019 – via Newspapers.com.
  10. Day, Mary Bostwick, Mary Noel Arrowsmith, and Idabelle Stevenson. "An Annotated Bibliography of Safety Education" Teachers College Record (1926).
  11. "'Safety First' is Taught in Schools". Lawrence Journal-World. April 30, 1923. p. 3. Retrieved September 16, 2019 – via Google News.
  12. Arrowsmith, Mary Noel (December 1923). "Education in Accident Prevention". The Highway Engineer and Contractor. 9: 57–58.
  13. "76,000 Meet Death Yearly in Accidents". Journal and Courier. May 10, 1924. p. 2. Retrieved September 16, 2019 – via Newspapers.com.
  14. "Safety Plans Being Tried at Local Schools". Buffalo Morning Express and Illustrated Buffalo Express. April 15, 1923. p. 71. Retrieved September 16, 2019 – via Newspapers.com.
  15. Robertson, Nancy Marie (2007). Christian Sisterhood, Race Relations, and the YWCA, 1906-46. University of Illinois Press. p. 156. ISBN 9780252031939.
  16. "Local YWCA Groups Plan Week of Prayer and Fellowship". Bradford Evening Star and the Bradford Daily Record. October 23, 1941. p. 4. Retrieved September 16, 2019 – via Newspapers.com.
  17. "Phases of Post-War World Discussed". Hartford Courant. March 14, 1943. p. 59. Retrieved September 17, 2019 – via Newspapers.com.
  18. Arrowsmith, Mary Noel (May 9, 1928). "Irredentism in Hungary". The Nation.
  19. Commission to Study the Organization of Peace, Fourth Report, Part III: International Safeguard of Human Rights (May 1944).
  20. Arrowsmith, Mary Noel. (May 1943) "Are the United Nations Moving Toward a Governed World?" pamphlet published by the National Peace Conference.
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