In 2025, Frontier Nursing University honored the 100-year anniversary of the inception of the Frontier Nursing Service. We are grateful for the alumni, students, couriers, donors, volunteers, friends, and employees who have made an incredible impact on FNU’s century-long journey. We celebrated this milestone year by capturing and sharing some of the countless stories that make up our history. Whatever your connection to FNU, we hope you enjoy these stories.
Former FNS nurse-midwife Delphine Jewell wrote the following letter in response to our call for stories for the Frontier Century of Stories project. She worked at Hyden Hospital from March 1956 to March 1957 and became a Certified Nurse-Midwife at Frontier. She went to do missionary work in Nigeria and Zimbabwe. She coordinated the establishment of an in-house birth center in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Delphine was a maternal-newborn nurse educator, serving as chair of the nursing education program for 12 years. She retired in 1992. Delphine is currently 94 years old and lives in a retirement center in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
From Delphine Jewell:
I had many interesting experiences while at Frontier Nursing Service. One of the most important lessons learned while there was one of Mary Breckinridge’s requirements:
It was required that all registered prenatal patients come to the hospital prenatal clinic for a check prior to delivery, even if they were scheduled for a home delivery. However, if a patient missed two prenatal visits, we made home visits to check on them. Patients were aware that this would happen, and some would not make the effort to get to the hospital, knowing that we would come to them.
As students, we questioned this requirement and felt the patient should take more responsibility. However, when we questioned this requirement, we were informed that this was a rule of Mrs. Breckinridge’s and she felt that if the life of one baby or mother could be saved due to such a rule, it was worth the trip. I remembered her ruling for the rest of my professional life and attempted to help my nursing students adopt this kind of philosophy when giving care.
I’m grateful to be alive and to have experienced the process of becoming a Certified Nurse-Midwife at the Frontier Nursing Service as it existed in 1956.
