Henderson, Lois Marie
Lois Marie Henderson: World War II
Latrica Rochelle Martin (Student Interview)
Interview Date: October 7, 2003
Q: When and where were you born?
A: Mountain Home, Arkansas.
Q: Mount Homa, Arkansas?
A: Mountain Home, Arkansas.
Q: Mountains Ahoma, Arkansas?
A: No, Mountain Home.
Q: Mountain Home, Arkansas? OK. What year was it that you were born?
A: 1922.
Q: 1922? Ah, When did you – do you remember when you joined the service?
A: No, I know it was March of (garbled) March the – I’m trying to remember – 17th of 1934.
Q: March 17, 1934?
A: Right. Finally got that together. That’s right. I had to go to Little Rock and be sworn in, you know, and it took me a long time to get in.
Q: Wow.
A: They were very careful who they took in the service. (garbled) They evaluated you very carefully and, ah, did (garbled).
Q: Wow, that’s a lot, isn’t it?
A: It was a lot to me. I mean – I was just determined. I had five brothers and three of them were in the service, so I decided to go to – I volunteered, of course. . .
Q: Wow. What branch did you join?
A: Navy.
Q: Navy?
A: I had a brother in the Seebees. . .
A: Wow.
A: When the Japs bombed Pearl Harbor, you know, he was over there (garbled) somewhere . . . that he brought for me.
Q: Wow.
A: And when he come home, he was (garbled) at construction.
Q: Did you ever go out on the ships or did you just stay on the mainland?
A: No, I worked in the hospital. The Navy has, I mean the service has two large hospitals in San Diego – that’s naval district headquarters – and so I spent my time in the medics there at the hospital.
Q: Wow. OK, I know what made you join. What made you decide to become a nurse?
A: Oh, I was already in training when I decided to join. I put my training aside until the war was over and after – I had two years. And, ah, I guess, a little over two years. And I waited until . . .
Q: So in civilian time you were already training for a nurse?
A: Yes.
Q: And then you joined the service and then . . .
A: And then I – yea.
Q: And so you already had two years in then.
A: I had two years in college and then I quit and joined the Navy because my kid brother was drafted, being drafted, and – Nick’s a little younger, and I thought anything he could do, I could do.
Q: (laughing) That’s the way to do it, isn’t it?
A: Yea.
Q: What area of nursing did you go into?
A: Surgery.
Q: Surgery?
A: After I was got through my basic training, I – I took, ah, ah, Navy training and, ah, at, ah, (garbled) – I mean in, ah, (garbled – tape stops and restarts) ) . . . they were going into the service and they were trained at, ah, Hunter College in New York City in a borough of New York City and . . .
Q: So it was Hunter College in the borough of New York . . ?
A: Hunter College, yea.
Q: OK. Ah, I read in your history, you weren’t only a military nurse. . .
A: Mam?
Q: I said I read in your history that not only were you a military nurse, but you said your husband was also in the military.
A: He – my husband was a physician assistant . . .
Q: Physician assistant?
A: Not a physician, a physician assistant. I want to get that clear because there’s not a whole lot of difference, but it counts in certification. Of course, my husband’s gone now and that wouldn’t make a lot of difference, but it would to me. I mean, I wouldn’t want to publish anything that wasn’t the truth.
Q: Oh, yea, I understand that, honey. What branch was he in?
A: He was in the army personnel – personnel officer in the army.
Q: OK.
A: He was Oklahoma’s recruiting officer – administrative recruiting officer for four years, and then, that’s where I met him.
Q: That’s a pretty important position.
A: Yes, it was. He had a lot of responsibility when the war came on. He was transferred to a missile – sent to El Paso for training, and we moved to El Paso because of the classified documents . . .
Q: Where were the two of you stationed when you met?
A: In the Navy, you mean?
Q: Uh-huh.
A: Well, I was – I went in to Mountain Home, Arkansas – I told you that before.
Q: Yeah. Is that where you met your husband?
A: No, I met him here in Oklahoma City. He was (garbled) a recruiting officer.
Q: So you transferred here, ah. . .
A: No, this is my home. . . southeastern part of Antlers . . . I mean, Oklahoma is my home.
Q: OK, shopping part of Antlers, you say?
A: Yea, Pushmataha County.
Q: OK, so when you were here, that’s when you met him in Oklahoma City?
A: Yea, when I was – I was working at, ah, Baptist Hospital. I met him when he was on recruiting duty. He was from Georgia.
Q: Were you still in the service at that time or were you out of the service?
A: No, no, I was out of the service. The war was over, of course.
Q: OK. You were in World War II?
A: Yea.
Q: OK. I’ve still got a lot to learn about that! Ah, do you remember when you were married? When the two of you got married?
A: No, as I say I was working here and my husband was on recruiting duty here and he – they invited my husband to dinner and they invited me to dinner. I knew – they didn’t let me know as much as I would have like to. And, ah. . .
Q: They were kind of playing matchmaker, huh?
A: Well, I worked with Mary (garbled) awhile, and, ah, they just thought he should have a wife! And after I met him, I did, too!
Q: (laughing) You thought he should, too, right?
A: Yea, that’s what . . .
Q: Do you remember the year you were married to him?
A: 1951.
Q: 1951? OK, do you remember the month?
A: Yea. Very well. July. I was born in July, and, ah, he was one day older than me. He didn’t have much on me!
Q: So you all were married in July of ’51?
A: Yea. My birthday’s the sixth and his is the fifth.
Q: So you kind of gave each other a birthday present, huh?
A: Mam?
Q: Kind of gave each other a birthday gift?
A: Yea, usually we went out to dinner or dancing – planned a night out, in other words.
Q: Yea. OK, my next one was how long did you serve in the service? Do you remember?
A: That was a little – almost two years the first time. Ah, I really don’t remember the date that I went in. I think I tried to give you one there awhile ago when I was in college.
Q: You said you went in there after college.
A: Yea.
Q: So, just a little over two years you were in the service?
A: Yea.
Q: Did you have a rank that you held?
A: What?
Q: Did you hold a rank?
A: No, not really. I don’t know where you got that. Somebody must have wrote on the. . .
Q: No, that’s just one of my questions.
A: Oh.
Q: Most – like I’ve talked to some people before where they were medics or nurses, and they were, like, a lieutenant or something like that.
A: Yea . . .
Q: So I just wondered if you had one?
A: Now my husband had a long line of stores . . he had to . . he was (garbled) . . .. he went to different towns. . . my husband was trained that way . . . and they, I think, along with the personal experience that he had had in the service, they just kept adding to that and keeping him in different towns . . .So (garbled) retail business. . . .
Q: That’s what he did outside of the service?
A: Yea, no, no, he was . . . qualified missiles at Tinker Field after he retired. . .
Q: Wow.
A: He handled classified documents . . .
Q: Hush-hush, though?
A: Yea.
Q: Ah, so you never had, like, lieutenant or sergeant to your title?
A: No.
Q: You were just a surgical nurse?
A: Yea, I was just in the Navy. That’s what the women – there was no title like the Marines had, you know, they called this one. . .
Q: So all the men got the ranks and the titles?
A: Well, yea. Well, they had sergeants and yeomans. You know, yeoman was an administrative, like for typing, shorthand, and all these sorts of situations.
Q: That’s pretty interesting. So, my next one is what was it like to you being a military nurse?
A: Well, (garbled) and it wasn’t a lot of changes, just a job, as far as the nursing – it wasn’t something I was gung-ho about. It was just something that I decided to do then.
Q: Did you enjoy it after you started doing it?
A: Well, it was what I was trained for. Of course, they needed me there, so I felt like I was – my time was well spent.
Q: You said you were a surgical nurse. Was that a real interesting position, or – being a surgical nurse?
A: It was interesting, but it was responsible.
Q: Yea. A lot of responsibility, I imagine.
A: Mam?
Q: I said, a lot of responsibility, I imagine.
A: (background noise) Who’s this?
Q: Oh yea, I’m always trying to make people smile. Ah, how do you feel now about – you spent those years taking care of other people – how do you feel now about someone taking care of you?
A: I feel like I contributed to work – to a very good cause, and I’m very pleased about it. Do over – I would do it again.
Q: You’d do it all again, huh?
A: Right.
Q: You’re going to make me cry! Ah, so you lived a good life and you have no regrets?
A: Right.
Q: Of all you’ve done?
A: Right.
Q: And (garbled) are you treated fairly? I mean, with those taking care of you. . .
A: By the way, I think I know somewhere where you got that doctor bit. My first husband was a doctor, but he died.
Q: Ah-huh.
A: And, ah, I wasn’t – we wasn’t married very long. We was, ah, (garbled) and he died.
Q: He got meningitis?
A: Yea.
Q: I’m sorry to hear that.
A: Thank you.
Q: (garbled) It was in your history. That’s probably where I read that.
A: Well, that – I was just a kid then. He was older – considerably older than me, so I hadn’t married well until the second time, so I just put that out of my life and went on. In other words, I had been married once before . . .when I went in the service.
Q: Knowing what you know now, do you ever feel like when they come in to do something for you or, you know, take care of you, do you ever try to tell them, well, I was a nurse once, so I know what you’re doing?
A: Oh, all the time. If it doesn’t suit me, I’ll let them know about it! And, ah, they let me know that they’re doing it and I’m on the other side of the fence now.
Q: So “I was there and I know what you’re doing and I know how to do it” (laughing).
A: Yea, well, they could say “I’ve been there, too,” you know, and, ah, I, ah, my college work was limited, so, that’s when I used to say, “well, I knew it.” My (garbled) caring for people and it wasn’t limited – the Lord – look what He did when he came to people who needed help. He helped them, and, I don’t know, I never miss a chance to witness for God if I . . .
Q: I hear you there.
A: Jesus was an example for us, so why not . . . He loves us. . . (garbled). . . and keep a plan in mind that He would approve of.
Q: (garbled)
A: What?
Q: Not many people still think that way anymore.
A: No, but, ah, we have a choice. (garbled) right over there. We have a choice. And I notice that when I . . pray and pray and until I was satisfied, I didn’t have any trouble finding a way.
Q: So pretty much, like you said, you have no regrets, because – you’d do it all again?
A: Yes.
Q: I don’t hear many people say that either. I’ll close that door real quick. You know there’s a few nurses’ aids here that are going to nursing school?
A: Yea.
Q: There’s myself and few more?
A: Yea, ah-huh.
Q: What kind of advice would you give them?
A: Well, (garbled) very carefully what to do, and then put your whole heart and try to evaluate your experience against what you know that you were taught. Be sure you don’t, ah, leave out any of the important points that one acquires . . . we’re each part of (garbled) today. That may not be a right account or quote on there, but . . . .
Q: It’s an original Lois quote, though.
A: Well, yea, it is . . .
Q: You think you should just make sure it’s what you want and put your whole heart into it?
A: Yea, and put your whole heart into it, and, ah, it pays off mentally and physically. You relax and be ready to go when He calls. I’ve had a couple of heart attacks and open heart surgery and, so, that’s pretty well experienced speaking.
Q: Yea. Pretty much been through it all, huh?
A: Yes. Yea. Nursing and being nursed has been a great part of my life.
Q: So you say that – now that you’re the one being taken care of, do you feel pretty gratified – satisfied?
A: Well, I (garbled) against them. I, ah, I see a lot of things from experience, you know, things that shouldn’t go on, but then, and I’m not talking about my care, but . . .
Q: Maybe like your roommate, or. . .
A: Nurses’ aids should, you know, when I was in school in nurses’ training I, ah, really tried to function in a frame of (garbled) mental action that I could follow everyday that was so taxing that I couldn’t adhere to it, but, ah, I guess I took too much from my nurses’ aids and LPNs and so forth.
Q: Their attitudes about their jobs really changed since you were a nurse?
A: Yes.
Q: Yea, I agree with you there. You have a lot of the ones that have good bedside manners, so to speak.
A: What?
Q: You have a lot of them that have good bedside manners?
A: Yes. There’s a lot of them . . .that I have known some RNs that just didn’t think to care or total up to what I held as my (garbled). . . except I was from the time I could walk, I guess, certainly from the time I remember. . .
Q: You kind of had a foot in it to start with?
A: Yea, I could – can still hear my father say, “well, think that over, think it over and come back to me.” I usually never went back. I knew what I was going to do.
Q: We’d go hide a book in our britches, because we knew what was coming!
A: Yea, well, my brothers were all good to me. I had two brothers that (garbled), and three have passed on.
Q: You have two in Talihina?
A: Huh?
Q: Two brothers in Talihina?
A: Yea. One’s a (garbled), and the other one spent nine years in the Navy as a cook, so he . . .he certainly is nice to have around!
Q: Well, coming to my last question, in your view, what makes a good nurse?
A: Conscientiousness and becoming a polished – your attitude toward – being a good listener. You have to . . .when you spend as many years as I did in surgery, you – the doctors don’t holler at you, they very slowly and carefully tell you what – next one what to do, and in other words, “hand me that” and “increase the drip,” you know. . . .
Q: You have to listen really good.
A: I mean, and things that were – lots of things. And, there’s just so many of them that it sounds foolish to start in – you know, the little – the little that I even know about it really. . . responsibility, and accuracy, and conscientiousness, and. . . it’s just – to me it was just a (garbled) and when I went home (garbled) completely.
Q: You tried to stay with it when you got back home.
A: No, I – in the Navy I, ah, I enjoyed working, but I enjoyed my husband and we had two children from my last husband. And my son got killed in a car wreck. He was a police officer in Shawnee. My daughter works for AT&T. And, ah, overall, I’ve had a well-rounded, good life. I’ve had a family. I had – I couldn’t complain about not having (garbled). I’ve traveled Europe with my husband, and, ah, a lot of people don’t get to do that, so I’m just thankful for all the things that have occurred in my past that were pleasant. And I have memories to lean – lean on. .
Q: Yea, and they’re all good memories.
A: Yea. Well, I don’t, ah, . . . I know the difference between mental health and mental illness and what depression and so forth, so I just pick myself up and remember what I had, you know. (garbled) And thought “what more could I want? I’ve been – traveled as much as I wanted to. I’ve had a family. My son – I never understood that because I . . . my son was killed in a car wreck, and, ah, put a load on my mind that I had to (garbled), and that’s the only way that I could get through. (garbled) You can condense it. . .
Q: Yea, I will.
A: It didn’t make any difference (garbled) what I say, and, ah. . .
Q: You think – you said you need to be conscientious and a good listener. Do you think it just takes a special person to be a nurse?
A: No, I think anyone that loves humanity (garbled) and, ah, I think – but what we learn – what was your question again now?
Q: Your view of what makes a good nurse?
A: No, I think that anyone can make a good nurse or a good doctor if they have the (garbled) background and desire to do that. I think – because I’ve known some girls that worked around surgery a little bit, you know, and the first thing you know they’d be gone. (garbled) You know, they decided . . .
Q: Decided to go elsewhere?
A: (garbled) is the way the doctors put it. We’ve covered about everything?
Q: Yea.
A: I went into a lot of things that you didn’t ask me.
Q: That’s fine.
A: Well, what I’m saying is (garbled) interview is one that will be interesting (garbled)
Q: Well, mainly I’m just talking with you and just kind of getting a background from you and what you’ve seen in the years.
A: Well, we did go over what was a . . hospital in San Diego. Two large hospitals. They were (garbled) hospitals.
Q: In San Diego?
A: Yea. (garbled) district headquarters, and the boys coming back from overseas were maimed and, leg or arm off, and so, I haven’t really gotten into it. . .
Q: Yea, I imagine.
A: But, it’s just as well. The Lord knows what He’s doing. Who am I to question him?
Q: Yea. We’re just here to do what He wants us to do, huh?
A: What?
Q: I say, we’re just here to do what He want us to do?
A: Right. That – we pray about a thing and He’ll answer us – He’ll satisfy us. And, ah, I know I awaken at night and (garbled) pray – beside my bed and pray until I fell asleep. I felt good. And ah, maybe I didn’t have all the answers right then, but I noticed a couple of days that those worries that I was confused – you know, that I considered them insurmountable, that they didn’t exist, is what I’m trying to say.
Q: He answered your prayers?
A: Yea.
Q: Yea, that’s how He works in mysterious ways.
A: Yea, He does. We never know – if I’d known, you know, what you wanted to hear, I wouldn’t have missed an opportunity to (garbled) on paper anyway.
Q: That might have been my fault, because you were thinking I was wanting you to write and all you had to do was just talk to me.
A: Yea, I can’t – can’t do much writing now, but I don’t’ know – I haven’t sat down at a typewriter, but I used to be pretty good typist! So, I’d use a typewriter if I can. And use the hunt and peck system.
Q: Yea, about the only thing I think that’s still the same between when you started as a nurse and the nurses of today is paperwork. We’ve all still got paperwork.
A: Yea, we – medication has changed.
Q: Yea, a lot.
A: (garbled)
Q: What hasn’t?
A: (garbled) you know, we’re still made in the form what the Lord made us (garbled). You know, if you study the Bible and really, the Lord talks to you through the Bible. It’s just pleasure (garbled), and He loves us enough to go to the cross.
Q: Yea.
A: So, I sit down and pray sometimes and I say, “Lord, you know what I need. I don’t.” And that makes it kind of . . .
Q: Yea, that’s understandable. So then in a couple of days He leads you where you need to go?
A: Yea, you worries are gone and you really don’t give the Lord credit enough – I don’t.
Q: I think he was my little conscience that got me going on the track I’m going now. I wouldn’t have gone to school for this if it wasn’t for that little voice talking to me.
A: Well, talking now, I don’t have many friends that I can talk to, but I find that if I just say “Lord, take my hand now.” I can talk to anyone – put my feelings on my sleeve, you know. I, ah, I still want to help, and I (garbled), but . . .being a nurse gives a little of it back. And that has helped me. I’m 81 years old, and, ah, like I said, I wouldn’t go back and change it.
Q: Wouldn’t change a thing, huh?
A: No, not unless I gave the Lord a little more time. And pray a little more now. Because one can’t pray too much.
Q: Well, you’ve lived a long life and all that you’ve seen up to today, and you deserve to have some time to rest now.
A: Mam?
Q: I say you deserve to have time to rest now and let someone else take care of you for a change.
A: I’m not worried. My husband, when he knew he was going to pass away, he said (garbled) I was standing beside his bed and (garbled) and he said “I am dying.” And (garbled) remember our children. . . .
