Description
Ms. Allemang recalls joining up and her first posting.
Margaret Allemang
Margaret Allemang was born July 19th, 1914 in Toronto, Ontario. Inspired by a childhood sickness, Ms. Allemang went into nursing in 1937. She trained at the University of Toronto, and when war arose she joined as it was "the thing to do". During her time of service, Ms. Allemang did not go overseas but was posted in several locations across Canada. After the war, Ms. Allemang collected oral histories from other nursing sisters as part of her thesis studies while pursuing her PhD in Education.
Transcript
Interviewer: And, so, when did you decide that you would like to join up? Did you have a chance after graduating in nursing? Did you work for awhile before the war started or...?
I worked for a year. I, I worked in the Toronto General Hospital in the cancer ward, second floor, Dunlap, and I was there a year and, oh, I don't know, having just graduated, the war was on, and it started and everybody was joining up and, and I, I thought, you know, I was ready for, to do something else, and this feeling that, you know, getting into the service was the thing to do, so I just went down without much deliberation and had a physical and they accepted me. So I was in the air force.
Interviewer: In the air force. How long was it after joining that you, where did you go first?
I went to St. Thomas to the, I don't know it's official name, technical training school, but there was a big hospital there and I was there for about four months...it was part of orientation and, and there were a lot of patients there and we did general staff nursing, really.