Photos captured over the past 60 years were on display at the Atholl Hotel as former Aberdeen nurses came together to mark a special anniversary.
The group started their nursing training at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary (ARI) on September 14, 1964 – and went on to have fulfilling careers in the city and further afield.
On Thursday, 17 of them reunited at the King’s Gate hotel to reminisce and celebrate the 60th anniversary of when they first met.
The trainees spent the final months of 1964 living at The Elms, opposite Albyn School, and “trekking” to ARI each day to learn all they needed to know about the world of nursing.
“The close contact with our fellow students meant that we were able to share a special camaraderie,” retired nurse Heather McDonald shared.
“We supported each other through good times with lots of laughter and cried together when faced with difficult and traumatic situations.”
After three years of hard work, the class qualified as Registered General Nurses (RGN) and went their separate ways.
Aberdeen nurses reunite to celebrate 60 years since meeting
While some stayed in the Granite City, others headed across the border and even overseas.
Great-grandmother Ada Pratt trained in orthopaedics in Edinburgh before moving to Rochdale where she eventually became a sister at the stroke unit.
“I loved every minute of nursing,” she shared.
Heather decided to specialise in midwifery and completed her training at Queen Charlotte and Chelsea Hospital in London – a time she said was comparable to the “true to life” Call the Midwife series.
As well as treating some famous families, she was witness to the early development of the scan.
“It was amazing to see history in the making,” she added.
Fellow nurses Bill Morgan and Sheena Yule spent their careers caring for communities in the north-east.
Before he retired in 2010, Bill spent 18 years in nursing and nurse education for the NHS and 29 years in occupational health.
Sheena also specialised as a midwife, a role she worked in across Aberdeen and Inverurie, before she had her own three children.
When she returned to work, she found herself back in the wards of ARI, this time on night duty in intensive care.
Nursing across the world
The qualifying class of 1967 have reunited in Aberdeen for anniversaries throughout their careers and retirement – which have all been captured on camera.
Back in the city where it all began on Thursday, they had the opportunity to share memories from the past 60 years and stories from those early training days in Aberdeen.
For Anne Milne, the city is also where she retired from her nursing career after a number of years in a health visitor role.
She had previously moved to London to do midwifery at Guy Hospital and also spent time working in Liverpool, Brighton and at the London Clinic.
An “amazing start” in nursing at ARI led to Alison Milligan working as a midwife in Africa before she moved to Canada to be a nursing administrator at the Jewish General Hospital in Montreal.
Heather also travelled overseas to work at The Nairobi Hospital in Kenya as a sister on a female surgical ward.
“This was the experience of a lifetime,” she said. “A totally different culture and country and I fell in love with it.”
She eventually ended up back in Aberdeen, based at the newly opened Denburn Health Centre, before the “nurse’s curse” – a bad back – forced her to retire after a 40-year career.
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