Clarrisa Harlowe Barton, better known as Clara Barton, was born on December 25, 1821 in North Oxford, Massachusetts. She was the youngest of five children. She did many important things in her life. She was a teacher, a battlefield nurse, and she began the Red Cross in America.
Clara Barton was famous for many reasons. She was a teacher who founded many school in New Jersey. She is most remembered for being the founder of the American Red Cross in the United States. She served as its president for more than twenty years. .
Clara had many childhood experiences learning from her older siblings. She had two brothers and two sisters, who taught her a lot. They taught her mathematics, reading, and how to ride a horse. When Clara was eleven years old, her older brother, David got hurt. He became very ill and Clara stayed by his side, nursing him for almost a year until he was better.
One of her goals was to become a teacher like her sisters and brothers. Another of Clara's goals was to become a soldier, or to at least be on a battlefield. Her sister Dorothy told her that girls were not allowed on battlefields, but her father, Captain Barton, said that if any woman could find a way onto a battlefield, it would be Clara. She went to Europe after the Civil War and met the Grand Duchess who asked Clara to help the International Red Cross. When she was helping them, she realized that many American soldiers would have lived if America had had a Red Cross. So she decided to persuade the United States government to establish a branch of the International Red Cross.
To achieve her goal of becoming a teacher, she studied very hard. Since her brothers and sisters had taught her at an early age, she already had a good understanding of schoolwork. Clara became a teacher at the young age of only fifteen. She taught for eighteen years when she decided it was time to do something new. She moved to Washington D.