I know of one registered nurse in my family to celebrate on National Nurses Day: my grandaunt Florence Meckler. Specifically, she was a pediatric RN. She was one of my maternal grandfather's younger sisters.
Florence was born December 22, 1915 (coincidentally, the exact same date as my maternal grandmother's oldest brother) in Brooklyn, New York. I don't know where she attended nursing school or when she graduated, but it must have been before 1939, because on January 1, 1939 there was a photo of her in the newspaper holding the first two children born in the new year at Beth El Hospital in Brooklyn. I am lucky enough to have the newspaper clipping because my grandmother saved it and had it in her photo album.
Exactly two years after that brush with fame, Florence married Moshe Amine, on January 1, 1941, in Brooklyn. Florence and Moshe had two children: Yedida, who was born one year after my mother, also on Armistice Day (now called Veterans Day); and Beth, six years later. Some years later Florence and Moshe divorced, and 20 years after that Florence married Max Stewart.
I don't know how long Florence worked as a nurse. I really should ask my cousins about that, shouldn't I?
I never met Moshe, but I knew Florence and Max. I visited them several times in Las Vegas, where they lived, when I went to conferences and trade shows there. I continued to visit Florence after Max passed away. We would usually go out to one of the big buffets in one of the casinos on the Strip.
Eventually, Florence moved to Scotts Valley, California, at the behest of her older daughter. And then I visited her there, in the Santa Cruz Mountains. I took her out for lunch and to go shopping. I drove a cargo van at the time, and I remember she had trouble stepping up high enough to climb in (she was a tiny person), so I started bringing a step stool to make it easier for her.
During all that time, I don't think I knew that Florence had been a registered nurse. But she definitely fussed over me about health stuff, trying to make sure I was taking care of myself.
And here's a photo of Florence holding me when I was about a year old, proving that we go back a long way. The teenager next to her is her younger daughter, my cousin Beth, who recognized herself and told me that we were at Disneyland.
