Antoinette Stornelli Shimer, 1948
B.A., Denison University
M.S.W., Case Western Reserve University
Oshkosh, Wis.
Citation awarded on Saturday, June 2, 1973
Currently instructor of social work in the department of sociology, anthropology, and social work in a husband/wife teaching term arrangement at the University of Wisconsin, she spent 13 years as a medical social worker in Japan. Sponsored by the United Methodist Church, she and her husband, following graduate work, worked at a community center at atomic-bombed Nagasaki for eight years before moving to Kobe in Japan. During their first years in Nagasaki, the Shimers ran medical and planned parenthood clinics. They visited neighboring schools and factories with an X-ray machine seeking potential tuberculosis victims. The disease was then the primary killer of Japanese.
As the city recovered from the bombing, it took over these tasks, but the center developed new ones. The Shimers opened up a day care program for the children of working mothers. Mrs. Shimer supervised a Japanese case worker and taught English to high school students and housewives.
In Kobe, she worked for the Association for the Advancement of Family Care. She also led a group of young adults and counseled young people of mixed (Japanese-Black American) parentage faced with decisions about their futures and to which culture they belonged. Much of her concern has revolved around the trauma in Japan induced by the breakdown of the traditional family structure, the changing status of women, and the effects of industrialization and racial conflict.
She has served as a trustee of Kawsui College.
In the states, she has been a medical and psychiatric social worker as well as engaging in home-finding and foster homes.
