Emmy Rappe

Who was Emmy Rappe?

Emmy Carolina Rappe, was a Swedish nurse and principal for a nursing school. She was one of the pioneers and founders of the Swedish nursing education. She was the first trained professional nurse and the first principal of the first nursing education in her country.

Rappe was born to Baron Adolf Fredrik Rappe and Ulrika Catharina Wilhelmina Hammarskjöld. She was given a strict education were a sense of duty and a sensible economy was regarded as important, and being unmarried, she stayed under the supervision of her family until the age of thirty. She had an early interest in medicine and nursing.

In 1866, the newly established Swedish Red Cross wished to establish a nursing school in Sweden, and was in search for an educated principal to head the institution. Sophie Adlersparre made a deal with Florence Nightingale, that the person selected for the task should be educated by Nightingale in London, and then advertised for a suitable candidate in her publication Tidskrift för hemmet. Rappe was considered to be a suitable candidate to establish a proper school for the education of professional nurses in Sweden.