Grace Drysdale
Grace Drysdale (died 1962) was involved in numerous social service organisations in Edinburgh and Scotland in the first half of the twentieth century, including the NVA (Eastern Division), which we know she worked in partnership with.
Grace Drysdale went to school in Edinburgh and then trained in social service in London and Bristol. She returned to Edinburgh in 1911 and became involved with the University of Edinburgh Settlement at High School Yards. At the outbreak of the First World War she moved down to London again to work with children, before coming back to Edinburgh in 1919 (Anon, 1950).
From 1920 to 1941 she was the Warden of Cameron House, part of the University of Edinburgh Settlement and in this role she undertook many activities to provide social, community and educational activities to both students and those who lived in the vicinity of the Settlement. She recognised that as slums around the Settlement were knocked down during the inter-war years those moving to the new housing development at Prestonfield would need support to rebuild community. Grace Drysdale developed community and educational opportunities for both children and adults at Cameron House, Prestonfield (Anon, 1962). In addition, Cameron House provided placements to train students from the University of Edinburgh Social Studies Department – social work students as we would know them today – with Grace Drysdale as their placement supervisor and assessor.
In 1940 she became the Deputy Secretary of the Scottish Council of Social Services – and as part of this became the first Secretary of the Scottish Old People’s Welfare Committee (SOPWC) which highlighted issues facing older people around needs and financial hardship and also sought to support the establishment of older people’s services and resources. This role saw Grace Drysdale travel around Scotland to meet different people and citizen’s groups, and to give talks (Bryan, 2018).
Alongside this work Grace Drysdale was involved with numerous other committees including being a member of the Scottish Housing Advisory Committee, which was particularly appropriate as she had a long-term interest in housing issues and needs (Anon, 1950). She was also a Director of the National Institute of House Workers, a member of the Royal Commission on Workmen’s Compensation and a member of the Scottish Council of Unmarried Mothers.
She had a long-standing and varied involvement with the City of Edinburgh Council of Social Service, an organisation which sought to promote partnership working between voluntary organisations focused on social work in Edinburgh. Between 1921 and 1945 she held positions on its Recreation Committee, Mothers’ and Infants’ Case Committee, Mental Welfare Committee, Executive and Finance Committee, Annual Donors and Subscribers Committee and its Citizens’ Advice Bureaux Committee (City of Edinburgh Council of Social Service, 1921, 1927, 1934, 1937 and 1940).
Grace Drysdale retired in 1950 but remained active – moving to Gifford in East Lothian and opening a country house where older women could go for a holiday to provide a break for their families (similar to a respite facility as we would know it today). Her obituary records her enormous energy and foresight in relation to her fields of work, and that “throughout her long life, her genial personality and a certain buoyancy of spirit infected all who came in contact with her. Her ready sympathy gave her an insight into the needs of people and she devoted herself wholeheartedly to their wellbeing.” (Anon, 1962, p8)
References:
Anon (1950) Pioneer of the University Settlement, Edinburgh Evening News, 5th June, page 4.
Anon (1962) Obituary: Miss Grace Drysdale: Social Work in Edinburgh, The Scotsman, 11th September, page 8.
Bryan, E. (2018) Speaking Up for Our Age: Celebrating 75 years of national and local older people’s groups and organisations in Scotland, 1943-2018. Edinburgh: Age Scotland.
City of Edinburgh Council of Social Service (1921) Fifteenth Annual Report.
City of Edinburgh Council of Social Service (1927) Twenty-Second Annual Report.
City of Edinburgh Council of Social Service (1934) Twenty-Eighth Annual Report.
City of Edinburgh Council of Social Service (1937) Thirty-First Annual Report.
City of Edinburgh Council of Social Service (1940) Thirty-Fourth Annual Report.