Training for Gas Attacks

gasmasksDorothyM.jpg

Dublin Core

Title

Training for Gas Attacks

Subject

Nurse Dorothy Managan and class of US Army Nurse Corps Recruits in Training with Gas Masks

Description

This image shows Army Nurse Corps recruits at Fort Lewis, WA, being trained in a way that many people do not realize nurses had to be trained. They are learning to use gas masks, just like soldiers and other military personnel planning to be near the front lines of battle. These specific recruits were trained in using masks by US Army Nurse Dorothy Managan (then Tonjes) and her fellow instructors at Fort Lewis, WA. Though the war would end right before Despite the fact that all fighting nations in World War II were reluctant and unlikely to use chemical warfare in battle, these recruits had to be prepared for the possibility that they would have to treat patients while encountering poison gas. Dorothy, while not being sent overseas, had to know how to use gas masks so that she could train her students, showing that all nurses, including those on the home front, needed to be ready for anything.

This is just one example of this training, and shows the dangerous conditions nurses had to work under during the war, especially when overseas. Nursing was not a glamorous or excessively feminine job, no matter what recruitment posters and wartime propaganda claimed. These women might not look like angels, but they would save lives in these masks just the same.

Creator

Unknown Photographer

Source

Courtesy of Dorothy Managan and Janis Allen

Date

Accessed April 25, 2020

Relation

World War II Veterans of the Carolinas: Their Stories in Their Own Words: An Honor Project of the Veterans History Museum of the Carolinas, by Janis Allen, October 13, 2019: https://www.amazon.com/World-War-II-Veterans-Carolinas/dp/1699033064/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=janis+allen&qid=1581536778&sr=8-1

Format

Photograph (jpg)

Language

English

Type

Still Image

Identifier

US Army Nurse Corps Recruits Training with Gas Masks Under Instruction from Dorothy Managan, WWII

Coverage

WWII Army Nurse Corps Training

Still Image Item Type Metadata

Original Format

black and white photo

Collection

Citation

Unknown Photographer , “Training for Gas Attacks,” US Nurses in World War II, accessed March 29, 2024, https://usnursesww2.omeka.net/items/show/55.