Today’s Google Doodle is a colorful tribute to Jane Addams (Sept. 6, 1860 – May 21, 1935), the famed social worker who, in 1931, became the first woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.
Addams also rose to prominence as a co-founder of Chicago’s Hull House, the country’s oldest settlement house that provided 123 years of social and educational services to the underprivileged. The Doodle is a simple illustration of the red brick structure, situated on the West Side of Chicago. No animation, no music, nothing fancy: just a straightforward tribute to Addams and to the settlement house, which she co-founded with fellow social reformer and activist Ellen Gates Starr. Last year, the institution closed its doors and filed for bankruptcy.
Addams was born into a wealthy Illinois family, the youngest of nine children. After dedicating her life to social justice, women’s suffrage and myriad other causes, she died in 1935, four years after winning her Nobel Prize. According to the New York Times‘ obituary, she ” blazed the trail for a scientific approach to the relief of poverty and suffering and was the parent of much of the social legislation of the last four decades.” The obit says that “world peace was forever dear to her heart” and described her as “serene, helpful, capable, dauntless.”
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