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1st Lt Marie Therese Burns Oral History Side A
Publication date: 17 July 2024
File metadata
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title:
1st Lt Marie Therese Burns Oral History Side A
creator:
Burns, Marie Therese (Poux) (1929 May 31 - )
subject:
AF Nurse Corps
description:
Side 1 of 2. Marie Therese Burns (formerly Poux) was born in Meadville, Pennsylvania on May 31, 1929. She was determined to become an Air Force Flight Nurse, despite familial attempts to dissuade her from doing so in favor of being a housewife. However, she had no desire to pursue any other Armed Forces service except to be a Flight Nurse. So, after completing a 3-year nursing program in Meadville and working for a year to get her nursing license, she enlisted August 1951 at Shepherd Air Force Base in Wichita Falls, Hughes Hospital without basic training. After two years there, she trained in flight school for 6 weeks in Montgomery, Alabama for personnel management in a crisis, skills for registered nurses, rescuing in the event of emergency water landing, etc. before graduating to serve overseas. She worked as a flight nurse in Military Air Transport Services with iron lung patients going from Korea to California to elsewhere in the United States, often having to work with as many as 46 patients to 1 nurse and only 1 transportable iron lung device. When serving at Brooks Air Force Base in San Antonio, she helped to evacuate the 2,000,000th patient to Westover Air Force Base in Massachusetts. She left the Air Force in 1954 to finish her education and start a family. In this interview, she shares anecdotes about emergency situations in the field, the policies and restrictions of nurses in providing medical care like giving IVs, and instances of going against authority and regulation to administer the best care. When she left the service, Burns had reached the rank of 1st lieutenant, and for her service she was awarded a National Defense Service Medal. No transcript of this interview is currently available.
publisher:
Military Women's Memorial Foundation
contributor:
Newman, Peggy Jane
date:
2004-04-08
type:
Audio
format:
Cassette
identifier:
129; 2004.129
source:
CLIR - Recordings at Risk
language:
English
relation:
584808
coverage:
Korean War (1950-1953) | 1951-54
rights:
Unrestricted