A Nursing School Diary

When Norma Hammond entered nursing school at Scott and White hospital in Temple, Tx., in 1954 she decided on a whim to keep a diary. In it she recorded the daily routine in the classroom and on the hospital wards that prepared her and her fellow students for their careers as professional nurses. Of equal interest, she also recorded life in the student nurses' dorm where she and her classmates lived together as such an amiable and fun-loving group that the friendships that began there would last a life time. On the occasion of the 25th anniversary reunion of the class-only one of many previous reunions-she culled through her diary to compose a recollection of the three happy years they had spent together in their "wild" youth. This is an edited and lightly expurgated version of that recollection. Graduate nurses from an earlier era will enjoy comparing their own educational experiences to that of this class, while contemporary nursing school students will no doubt be amused-and perhaps even astonished-by the differences between yesterday's and today's nursing school philosophy and practices.