Volunteers in bordering countries are assisting too, Osment said. They are delivering food and hygiene parcels, providing first aid training, evacuating people with disabilities, and helping first responders save lives in Ukraine. A recent program, Restoring Family Links, in 2021 reunited more than 7,000 families who had been separated by international war, conflict and disaster, says Emily Osment, a spokeswoman for the American Red Cross.Īs Putin’s war in Ukraine intensifies, staff and volunteers from the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, as well as in-country societies, are helping families there and in neighboring countries. (© Bettmann/Getty Images) Today’s Red Cross soldiers gather drums of donated blood near a personnel carrier on a makeshift tarmac during World War II. The organization went on to establish the first nationwide civilian blood-donation program after the war. She died eight years later, in 1912, but her legacy continues.ĭuring World War II, the American Red Cross started collecting blood for injured troops at blood centers around the country - it was converted to dried plasma before it went to field hospitals overseas. Watson says the organization’s relief efforts there helped about 700,000 people.īarton retired in 1904 after serving as president for 23 years. (© Library of Congress/Corbis/VCG/Getty Images) Russian peasants receive much-needed nourishment. In 1892, when Barton was 70, she took the organization global, partnering with other service organizations for the Red Cross’s first international mission - supporting victims of a Russian famine. After the 1893 Sea Islands Hurricane near Savannah, Georgia, Barton helped distribute donated clothing to survivors and repair clothes for survivors to resell. Gemeny Wilkinson)įollowing the 1889 Johnstown Flood in Pennsylvania, the Red Cross built temporary housing while its Philadelphia chapter provided doctors and nurses. The organization raised money and brought in supplies for survivors. In the beginning, the American Red Cross focused primarily on domestic disaster relief, lending a hand to people whose lives were upended by forest fires, floods and hurricanes. The Red Cross responds to an emergency every eight minutes, according to its website. The organization, through its blood drives, supplies nearly 40% of the nation’s blood supply - all from volunteer donors. It teaches lifesaving skills, provides international humanitarian aid, and backs military personnel and their families. The American Red Cross has continued to shelter, feed and offer emotional support to disaster survivors. But the trip inspired Barton to found the American Red Cross on May 21, 1881. “It started out as a vacation and turned into work,” says Susan Watson, historian and archivist at the American Red Cross. And she went to Paris to direct relief work - providing food, clothes and money to civilians. She helped displaced people move from Strasbourg to Haguenau, France. She worked with Grand Duchess Louise of Baden to establish sewing factories in Strasbourg, France, that hired women to make clothes for residents.
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