Basic HTML Version
It’s 1943, at the height of World War II. Capt. W.F. “Tex” Rankin is
starting his ascent to 20,000 feet in his C-87 Transport over the
Hump—what allied pilots called the strip of land over the eastern
end of the Himalayan Mountains in Burma. His job is to transport
passengers and resupply the Chinese and U.S. Air Force bases.
Broken clouds scatter blue skies. It’s unusually peaceful and serene.
Then, Tex glances to his right and sees a Japanese fighter 30
seconds from his path.
“I rolled my big bird over to a cloud bank,” says Tex. If that Japanese
fighter had seen his plane, it would have killed him. “I wouldn’t be
here talking to you today.”
When they safely landed on the ground, the army officer who Tex
was carrying was so grateful to be alive that he invited Tex out
to dinner that night with a group of army nurses, including one
brown-eyed, brown-haired beauty from Indiana.
That’s where he met Lt. Pauline (Polly) Curry and her 24 volunteer
nurses. “They were there to evacuate patients from Burma and
China,” says Tex.
These nurses lived in tents with dirt floors, drank water from lister
bags—canvas water bags filled with purified drinking water—had
no running water, and slept on rope mattresses surrounded by
mosquito nets.
“They lived a terrible life in India,” says Tex.
But that’s why Tex fell in love with nursing and his wife of 55
years, Polly. He admired what they were doing and what they
were sacrificing.
Polly didn’t start off as a nurse. She tried business school but didn’t
like it. So she enrolled at Johns Hopkins University and earned
her nursing degree and went to work for American Airlines as a
flight attendant. Back then, flight attendants had to have a nursing
degree in order to get the job. But when she saw a poster of Uncle
Sam saying, “We need you!” she quit her job and volunteered for
the army.
If that Japanese fighter had seen his plane, it
would have killed him.
“I wouldn’t be here
talking to you today.”
A Love Affair
with Nursing
By Sarah Angle
Pauline “Polly” Rankin assists a soldier duringWorld
War II. (Photo courtesy of Andrea and Tex Rankin)
Features: Cover Story
Harris College of Nursing & Health Sciences ·
6