Matilda A. Evans House

Front inscription

Dr. Matilda A. Evans (1872-1935), an African American physician, as well as a public health and civil rights advocate, lived here 1928-1935. A graduate of the Schofield School in Aiken and Oberlin College, Evans received her M.D. from the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania in 1897. She moved to Columbia that year and in 1901 founded the first African American hospital in the city.

Reverse inscription

Taylor Lane Hospital & Training School for Nurses, described in 1910 as “a monument to her industry and energy,” burned in 1914. Evans soon opened St. Luke’s Hospital & Training School for Nurses, which closed in 1918. She served in the U.S. Army Sanitary Corps during World War I and later founded the S.C. Good Health Association. In 1922, Evans became the first female president of the all-black Palmetto Medical Association.