Tryphena Anderson Explained

Tryphena Anderson (born 1933) was a Jamaican-British nurse, the first black health visitor in the United Kingdom.

Life

Tryphena Anderson was born in Jamaica, where she attended a Church of England school. In December 1952, a week after leaving school, she sailed for England, arriving in Liverpool on the RMS Franconia from New York.[1]

Anderson recalled teachers having low expectations of her at school.[2] As a black person in 1950s Britain, Anderson felt labelled as a "darkie" rather than truly accepted as a "person". She felt acute isolation:

Anderson nevertheless trained successfully as a nurse at Nottingham General Hospital and did psychiatric nursing at the Coppice Hospital. She did further postgraduate training in the early 1960s. In 1966 she qualified as a midwife, and in that year also became Britain's first black health visitor.[1]

From 1988 until 2002 she owned and ran a nursing home.[1]

Notes and References

  1. Book: Ann Kramer. Great Britain: Department of Health. Many Rivers to Cross: Caribbean People in the NHS 1948-69. 2006. The Stationery Office. 978-0-11-322721-1. 32.
  2. Book: James G. Cantres. Blackening Britain: Caribbean Radicalism from Windrush to Decolonization. 2020. Rowman & Littlefield. 978-1-5381-4355-1. 51.