Lavinia L. Dock

Lavinia Lloyd Dock (February 26, 1858 – April 17, 1956) was an American nurse, feminist, writer, pioneer in nursing education and social activist. Dock was an assistant superintendent at Johns Hopkins School of Nursing under Isabel Hampton Robb. She founded what would become the National League for Nursing with Robb and Mary Adelaide Nutting. Dock was a contributing editor to the American Journal of Nursing and authored several books, including a four-volume history of nursing (with M. Adelaide Nutting as co-author) and Materia Medica for Nurses, the nurse's standard manual of drugs for many years. In her later life, she also campaigned for social reform, particularly women's rights.

Early life Lavinia Dock was born one of six children in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania on February 26, 1858. Dock's mother died when she was eighteen. She and her siblings were financially independent due to an income from a land that their parents inherited, which allowed her greater choice in her career path.

In 1884, Dock enrolled at the Bellevue Hospital School of Nursing in New York and graduated in 1886, working there afterwards as a night supervisor.

Previously at Bellevue, Dock herself experienced the problems nursing students faced when studying drugs. In 1890, financed by her father, she authored the first nurses' drug manual, Materia Medica for Nurses. It became a standard nursing school text and sold over one hundred thousand copies.

Dock withdrew from nursing at around age 50 and focused more on contemporary social matters.

Social Reform Dock was a great proponent of gender equality and most notably women's suffrage throughout her life. In 1896, Dock moved to the Henry Street Settlement on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, where her friend Lillian Wald resided. There she became socially active. She joined the Women's Trade Union League (WTUL). She participated in the New York shirtwaist strike of 1909 in support of the employees who walked off, most of which were women. In 1907, she joined the Equality League of Self Supporting Women and involved herself with the NY Women's Trade Union. which became a rallying cry on banners during picketing at the White House. She participated in protest movements for women's rights that resulted in the 1920 passage of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which granted women the right to vote.

In 1976, Dock was inducted into the American Nurses Association's Hall of Fame.