ELLEN L. BRENNER, 1918-2004
Longtime obstetrical nurse served during World War II

Ellen L. Brenner, 85, who was an obstetrical nurse during a 40-year career interrupted by World War II Army Nurse Corps service overseas, died Thursday in the Hospice of Northwest Ohio, Perrysburg Township, from complications of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
Mrs. Brenner, of South Toledo, retired in 1980 as a registered nurse at Medical College of Ohio Hospitals, her husband, Robert, said. She had been head nurse in the obstetrics department there and at its predecessor, Maumee Valley Hospital.

She was fastidious, her husband said, and her aim was to make sure that patients had the best care when she was on duty.

"Her life was content," he said.

Mrs. Brenner grew up in East Toledo and was a 1936 graduate of Waite High School. She was a 1939 graduate of nursing training at Riverside Hospital.

"She was always an all-honors student," her husband said. "They were very poor kids. When she went into nurses' training, there was a group in Toledo, they were business women, who would give honors students an opportunity to get a loan to go through school.

"She went through nurses' training knowing she would always have a job. And she was such a compassionate person, I don't know what else she could have done."

Mrs. Brenner began her career at Riverside in obstetrics.

"She loved kids. She came from a family of seven," her husband said. "She was so tender, she didn't want to see the harsh side. She would rather see a baby come in than see someone dying."

Within days of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941, she and several nursing colleagues joined the Army Nurse Corps. She became a surgical nurse and cared for the wounded in North Africa, Italy, and France.

"When the bombs would drop, they couldn't leave the table nine times out of 10 [because] some poor soldier was lying there," her husband said. "She said she was scared for two years, more than anybody ought to be. She said it made [her] know you can work under those conditions and do what you have to do. She was very strong."

She was discharged as a first lieutenant.

From: http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040508/NEWS13/405080382/-1/NEWS