Biographical / Historical

Myra Clark was born in Middleboro, Massachusetts in 1916. As a child she was involved in Girl Scouts and once received a scout pin from Juliette Low, founder of the Girl Scouts. While in that organization she received letters of recommendation written by Mrs. Herbert Hoover and Mrs. Calvin Coolidge. She graduated from Memorial High School in 1936 and trained as a nurse at New Hampshire State Hospital in 1939 with stipend of $10.00 a month. Next, she went to the Orange Memorial Hospital in Orange, New Jersey where she received her R.N. degree in 1942. She trained as a Navy Nurse at the Brooklyn Naval Hospital and received training as a medical illustrator at New York City. She was stationed at the Great Lakes Naval Hospital in Great Lakes, Illinois. In 19445 she served as a U.S. Navy Corps Nurse at the Aiea Hospital in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. She finished the last two years of military service at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. In 1947 she retired from the Navy as a lieutenant commander. Clark attended the University of Virginia, School of Nursing for a B.S.N. Ed and graduated from that program in 1950. She served as Assistant Director of Nursing Education at the Blue Ridge Sanatorium. She received a Master's degree in counseling and education from University of Virginia in 1956. She became the Director of the Blue Ridge Sanatorium and served in that capacity until it closed in 1972.

Scope and Contents

The Myra Clark collection is a well-rounded photographic documentation of Clark's life as a Navy Nurse during World War II at Pearl Harbor. Clark took pictures of her experiences chronicling three segments of her life: beginning with her experiences at the Great Lakes Navy Training Station, continuing as a naval nurse serving at a hospital in the Pearl Harbor area during the 1940s and finally, as a naval nurse stationed at the National Navy Hospital in Bethesda, Maryland. Her personal and professional experiences are well documented by photographs taken personally by Clark. The photographs were originally taken from four scrapbooks created by Clark. The photographs were kept in their original order whenever possible in order to preserve the time period and place that was being captured. The newspaper clippings were scanned. There are two scanned biographical newspaper clippings in folder one. This collection contains original photographs owned by Clark of American nurses returning from Japanese Internments Camps in February of 1945. Many of the photographs appear in the book, We Band of Angels by Elizabeth M. Norman published by Pocket Books in 1999. The Center for Nursing Historical Inquiry has two copies of the book in their collection. Important publications in the collection include two recruitment booklets; The White Force" about the history of Navy Nurses, and "The Army Nurse" which contains facts, figures and photographs chronicling the history of the U.S. Army Nurse Corps. Other publications of interest are newsletters and year books from the Aiea Heights Hospital in Pearl Harbor where Clark was stationed that provide local historical detail. This collection embodies the professional dignity and pride that Clark and the Navy Corps Nurses represent in the profession of nursing.

There are two CD of photographs in this collection. CD#1 contains 5 personal photographs of Clark and a poem and is in Folder one in Box 1. CD #2 contains (11) scanned photographs of the American nurses returning a Japanese Internment Camp in 1955.

Arrangement

Box 1 contains CD # 1; the contents are listed immediately below in finding aid on folder one. This box contains well over 100 photographs taken by Clark documenting the first chapter of her life as Navy Corps Nurse while stationed at Great Lakes Naval Training Station in Illinois. The photographs are scenic, personal portraits and pictures of other nurses and Navy personnel. There are also many period postcards of various places including Great Lakes, New York and Hawaii. Some of the more interesting publications are in folder two which document the history of both the Army Nurse Corps and the Navy Nurse Corps. Folder seven has publications of interest including a year book and newsletter from Aiea Heights Hospital and ship and hospital orientation booklets, and scanned newspaper clippings of important evens such as Pearl Harbor's open house and the arrival of Admiral Nimitz. The dates for most of the photographs appear to be c. 1943-1945. The publications are also from this time period. The last folder (Folder eight) contains photographs of her life as a Navy nurse at an Aiea Heights Hospital in Pearl Harbor area c. 1944 during World War II. These are continued in Box 2 of this collection.

Box 2 in the Myra Clark collection contains photographs of Pearl Harbor during the 1940s, the Aiea Hospital and nursing staff. Folder three contains pictures of the interior of an unidentified hospital and it includes an Iron Lung, hospital staff & patients, surgery, & physical therapy. Folder four and five are Clark's collection of photographs of the freed American Nurses returning from a Japanese Internment Camp near Manila, Philippines in 1955. Most of the photographs were identified by documentation from this collection. Other photos were identified in the book, We Band of Angels by Elizabeth M. Norman, in the CHNI collection. There is a CD of scanned copies of these photos in folder four. Photos from Clark's time at the National Naval Medical Center at Bethesda, Maryland which include Navy nurses marching in parade are found in Folders six and seven. Finally, photos from Clark's experiences at Director of the Nursing School at the Blue Ridge Sanatorium in Virginia are in folder eight.