New York Training School for Deaconesses (NYTSD)

Founded on May 9, 1891, by William Reed Huntington and Mary Abbot Emery Twing, it provided a two-year residential course for women interested in becoming deaconesses, serving as missionaries, or working in Christian education. Shortly after it was founded, a woman's anonymous gift provided a house for the school. This gift was called an “act of Faith to a work of Faith.” The house served as a residence for the deaconesses being trained. It was named St. Faith's House and sometimes the school was called St. Faith's Deaconess Training School. One of the leading female deans of the school was Susan Trevor Knapp. The courses included Old Testament, New Testament, church history, and theology, which were usually taught by local priests. There were also practical courses in household management, ecclesiastical embroidery, missionary instruction, and the cutting and making of wearing apparel. The school offered summer internships in hospitals or city ministries. In 1910 it moved to a new building constructed on the grounds of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. The school closed in 1942. It reopened again in 1944, but closed permanently in 1948. See Knapp, Susan Trevor.