Frances Jacobs (née Wisebart; March 29, 1843 – November 3, 1892) was born in Harrodsburg, Kentucky, to Jewish[1] Bavarian immigrants and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio.

She not only dreamed of free kindergartens and orphanages, a home for the aged and a hospital, but with good business sense brought them to reality.

"[2] Frances Wisebart Jacobs was quoted in the Rocky Mountain News, August 27, 1888, as having said: "I know that whenever women lead in good work, men will follow.

"[8][12] Starting in the 1860s, when tuberculosis (TB) was a worldwide problem, physicians in the eastern United States recommended that their patients go to Colorado.

[15][16] To meet the needs of Jewish pioneers living in Denver,[17] in 1872 Jacobs organized, and was president of, the Hebrew Ladies' Benevolent Society.

[18] Jacobs was troubled by the number of critically ill people with tuberculosis she saw on the streets and who lived like refugees in tents and shacks.

As a member and early president of the Hebrew Ladies' Benevolent Society, Jacobs cared for critically ill Jewish people living in squalor along the Platte River banks and West Colfax by bringing soup, coal, clothing, soap and physicians.

[2][19] West Colfax, comparable to New York City's Lower East Side, was a community primarily of Eastern European Jews.

[8] Jacobs visited the free Golden Gate kindergarten when she attended and spoke at the San Francisco convening of the National Conference of Charities and Correction.

[6] Jacobs wrote of the Denver residents reaction to people with tuberculosis, "Most of the community ignores those who roam the city coughing or hemorrhaging.

"[13] In 1883 she organized a hospital benefit and over several years insisted that the Denver community face the reality of the lack of respectful treatment services and facilities.

She contracted pneumonia and was hospitalized at Marquette Sanitorium in Denver and died on November 3, 1892, following the illness that lasted for three months.

Appel, her coworker said "For long years she gave her time and her services to the practical work of charity, and looked more poor and wretched people in the face than any other person in Denver.

[24] A bronze statue sits in the lobby of the National Jewish Medical and Research Center, a memorial to Jacobs, with her holding a bag of medicines and soaps.