"U.S. CADET NURSE CORPS": VIBRANT AMERICAN WORLD WAR II POSTER OFFERING FREE EDUCATION TO PROSPECTIVE NURSES

(WORLD WAR II) Ross, Alexander. Poster: A Lifetime Education Free for High School Graduates Who Qualify U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps. [Washington]: Government Printing Office, 1945. Chromolithographic poster, measuring 18-1/2 by 16 inches, linen backed, floated and framed, entire piece measures 21 by 28-1/2 inches. $3200.

Lovely original World War II poster soliciting high school graduates to become U.S. Cadet Nurses, illustrated with a nurse smartly dressed in the official uniform and two teenage schoolgirls holding books—future cadet nurses.

This original 1945 poster features a cadet nurse in three-quarter profile wearing her full Cadet Nurse Corps uniform as well as the era's iconic red lipstick, while two teenage girls holding books look on from the side. The U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps was created by the Congress and signed into law by FDR in 1945 to respond to a nationwide nurse shortage. Supervised by the United States Public Health Service, the cadet nurses were actually educated by state nursing schools and accredited by the individual states. The program was open to all women between 17 and 35 who were in good health and had graduated high school. As a result of the transparent requirements and an official discrimination ban in the legislation, nursing became one of the most integrated professions in the United States. The fact that the training was free helped to lift many women out of poverty. The program only operated for five years—1943 to 1948—but the various schools graduated well over 100,000 nurses. After the war, many credited the Corps with preventing the collapse of civilian healthcare. Mailing information on verso (to the public library in Westminster, Maryland) so that each advertising poster could be folded and mailed without additional packaging.

Only light wear mainly to folds and a couple tiny spots, light soiling to verso. Near-fine condition.