Muhlenberg's oldest nursing alum celebrates 97th

Mildred Goff's 1934 graduation portrait.

Mildred Goff Garrett, 1934 Muhlenberg Nursing School alumna, recently celebrated her 97th birthday. Mrs. Garrett is shown above in her graduation portrait and below in a recent photo.

Her son, Bill Garrett, is a Plainfield history buff and preservation enthusiast, and has donated thousands of historic photographs from the Paul R. Collier collection to the Plainfield Public Library.

Mildred Goff Garrett now lives in Wolfeboro, N.H.

Bill relates that upon graduation his mother became the head nurse in charge of the 'accident room' (in the days before Emergency Rooms). The job required living at the hospital. If there was an emergency at night, she would go down, unlock the door and turn on the lights before the ambulance arrived.

Bill's father George drove the ambulance (there was no Rescue Squad until years later) and the couple met when he brought a patient to the 'accident room'. Their first date was a bus trip to Newark -- for ice cream sodas! Since the hospital discouraged fraternization between employees, Mildred and George used to slip off to a small brick bus shelter at the corner of Park Avenue and Randolph Road to be alone.

The 1929 Buick ambulance that Mildred's future husband George drove.

According to Bill, there was a dog living at the hospital. Occasionally he would disappear and George would have to go looking for him, usually finding him sleeping on some patient's bed, getting his ears scratched. (So today's 'therapy dogs' may not be such a new thing after all.)

Mildred also identified the operating room staff members in the Collier photo below, taken ca. 1940.

Operating Room in the 'old wing' of Muhlenberg, ca. 1940.
From left: Dr. Valentine, Dr. Hayward Day, Dr. Wolfe Lurie,
O.R. Supervisor Evelyn Lawson, and Mildred Bahr, RN.

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-- Dan Damon [follow]

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