Mabel Thorp Boardman

Mabel Thorp Boardman (born Oct. 12, 1860, Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.—died March 17, 1946, Washington, D.C.) was an American Red Cross leader who reestablished the organization’s funding base and greatly extended its other resources and services.

Boardman was from a well-to-do family and was educated privately. She devoted time to various social philanthropies, and during the Spanish-American War in 1898 she was active in recruiting nurses. In 1900 her name appeared, apparently without her knowledge, as one of the incorporators on the application of the American Red Cross for a congressional charter. She accepted the involvement, secured a seat on the executive committee of the Red Cross, and began studying the work of international Red Cross groups. She quickly concluded that the leadership of the aging and autocratic Clara Barton was the root of public apathy about the Red Cross, and she began to agitate for change. In 1903 Boardman used her political influence to cause the withdrawal of government support. When, after Barton’s resignation in 1904, the Red Cross was rechartered, Boardman became the effective head of the organization.

Boardman refused formal chairmanship, insisting that the occupancy of the conspicuous positions by men was necessary to retain public confidence. To that same end, she worked hard to develop support for the Red Cross among the socially prominent. By her indefatigable labours the Red Cross accumulated a large endowment fund, established branches across the country, greatly improved its lifesaving, first aid, and other services (in part through hard-won cooperation with such groups as the American Nursing Association), and developed a readiness to respond quickly to disasters and military needs. In 1915 Boardman published Under the Red Cross Flag at Home and Abroad. In April 1917 a Red Cross War Council superseded the regular executive committee, and Boardman was relegated to relatively minor tasks. She failed to win reappointment to the reconstituted executive committee in 1919.

In September 1920 Boardman became, on appointment by Pres. Woodrow Wilson, the first woman member of the Board of Commissioners of the District of Columbia. In 1921 she returned to the Red Cross as a central committee member and national secretary. She opposed unsuccessfully the development of permanent social services by the Red Cross under the leadership of professionals, and from 1922 she devoted herself mainly to continuing the tradition of volunteer service. She organized the Volunteer Service (later Volunteer Special Services), including nurse’s aides, a motor corps, a canteen corps, a home service corps, and the “Gray Ladies,” and was director from 1923. She resigned as director of the Volunteer Special Services in 1940, when the ranks numbered more than 2.7 million volunteers, and from the central committee of the Red Cross in 1944.