Vera Jenkins Booker Community Room

The Vera Jenkins Booker Community Room. Image from the Selma and Dallas County Chamber of Commerce Facebook page. 

The Dallas County Health Department (DCHD) has named its community room after Vera Jenkins Booker, a "trailblazing" nurse who was one of the first black nurses to be hired by the department.

A story by Faith Callens featured on the DCHD website said that Booker worked at the Good Samaritan Hospital on the corner of Washington Street and Voeglin Avenue in Selma before joining DCHD. 

She was the nurse supervisor in 1965 when activist Jimmie Lee Jackson was brought in for treatment after he was shot in Marion during a protest. She was among those who cared for him before he passed away days later. 

The community room was dedicated to Booker on Feb. 13 in the presence of DCHD Administrator Sarina Stewart with Senator Robert Stewart, Dr. Constance Smith Hendricks and others. 

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