From Mark Hess at Team CAP. This one will amaze you.
1951 ParaNurses Rescue Unit (Connecticut Wing)
http://www.scribd.com/doc/50628975/1951-CAP-ParaNurses-Rescue-Unit
Cheers,
Mark
As per usual on this site - give it a little time to load. Thanks MARK!
Ahh, the most notorious of all parachute landing techniques: The "Feet-knees-face" landing.
Thats a great article (love all the kitschy 1950s extraneous details..)
I love the expression of the nurse at the jump door. She looks a little less than committed to her fate. Not fear, not trepidation, more a question of logic - "I'm a nurse for Gosh sakes, how'd I'd get myself talked into this?"
Remember in 1951, jumping from airplanes was still pretty much an exotic and hardcore adventure.
........ and then the CAP insurance company took one look at Mrs Oliver and CAP members never parachuted again! :-)
Pretty cool!
But, geez, considering the scope of the nursing profession at that time, and the primitive level of emergency medicine and field medic stuff in those days, before the creation of EMT's and paramedics, it is a good thing that they were probably never employed. But I will give credit for being pioneers.
As an aside, I have heard but not verified, that the first US military female parachutist was an Army Nurse Corps officer drop to the site of a plane crash in the China-India-Burma theater in WWII. Probably was locally trained, is my guess. (but then again, that claim to "first" might be disputed by the OSS?)