As our series on St. Francis Hospital continues, many readers have shared memories of relatives who worked there—some still with us, others gone plus one story from a patient. We are honored to share their stories.
Emmie Lung Vawter: Nursing Class of 1953
Emmie Lung Vawter vividly recalls every name and face from her three years at St. Francis School of Nursing (1950–1953). She remembers the hospital leadership and staff: Sister Stanislaus, Director of Nursing; Sister Caroline, Hospital Administrator; Sister Rachel, Assistant; and floor supervisors Sisters Regina, Agnes, and Denise.
Other key figures included Father Clancey, Sister Marcelline (head cook), and Miss Grundstead in X-Ray.
Two house mothers, Ethel Sharklin and June Ingles, cared for students, while maintenance was handled by Mr. McCullough and Mr. Baker, with Grant Spry assisting in gardening. Helen Connelly ran the laundry with several helpers.
Emmie recalls the sisters ran a tight ship—students had to do tasks right the first time or start over.
Respect was paramount; nurses stood when doctors approached the desk.
Training lasted a solid three years with few breaks—no summers off. Nurses lived under strict curfews: 10 p.m. on weekdays, midnight on weekends.
She also explained that the Sisters that wore white were in the nursing field.
The sisters who wore black were in the business department. However when the nuns went out in public they always wore black habits.
A tunnel connected the red brick (nurse cadet residence) building to the hospital so utilities, supplies and such could be transported back and forth. The hospital had no piped-in oxygen; heavy metal tanks were lugged to patients and plastic tents placed over those who needed oxygen.
Patients had no bathrooms in their rooms and relied on bed baths and bedpans.
Emmie’s class started with 10 students; only five graduated. After graduating, she worked in surgery at St. Francis (1953–1961), then as a private nurse for Dr. Durango (1961–1968), Dr. Cuva (1968–1974), and finally Drs. T.K. and Gloria Cheng (1974–1993). She is mother to Debbie, Vickie, and Jerry.
Kathleen Schuster Markey: St. Francis Nurse’s Aide and Lifelong Nurse
Kathleen Schuster Markey, now 97, knew from childhood she wanted to be a nurse, folding wax paper into nurse’s hats. Between her junior and senior years of high school, she worked as a nurse’s aide at Macomb’s St. Francis Hospital. After graduating Carthage High School in 1945, she planned to attend St. Francis School of Nursing.
Two events led Kathleen to Peoria’s St. Francis School instead: her brother’s burns required treatment there, and a high school workplace accident damaged her finger, providing a settlement that funded her education. Her Peoria class had 63 students, far larger than Macomb’s 8–10.
Kathleen remembers Macomb’s hospital as imposing and the sisters strict but fair. After graduating in 1948, she worked in Keokuk (including private ICU duty), then Carthage after its new hospital opened in 1950. She became a school nurse in 1965 for Colchester/Plymouth and, in 1974, the first head nurse at McDonough County Health Department, serving 14 years. She finished her career with 29 years at Bridgeway, working two days a week until just before her 90th birthday.
Kathleen and her husband raised eight sons, including two sets of twins all while Kathleen worked full-time as a RN. Kathleen has been nursing for the better part of five decades.
Gene Hall: Maintenance Man, 1960–1967 Gene Hall, 91, calls his maintenance job at St. Francis Hospital “the best job” he ever had. In his early 30s, he helped remodel nearly the entire building. When the hospital’s closure loomed, he found it devastating.
Hall recalls assisting during a carbon monoxide emergency at WIU’s campus, helping apply oxygen to 13 men in a hallway. Eleven were released; two stayed overnight.
His duties included boiler maintenance, painting, repairs, and troubleshooting the 1903 building. Near the end, he built a kneeling bench for the chapel, which the sisters took with them when they left.
Gene fondly remembers the marble foyer, double staircase with brass rail, and stained glass chapel window. When demolition began in 1973, he couldn’t watch but heard the hospital’s solid construction damaged the crew’s equipment.
He has four children; Brad Hall, David Hall, Beth Hall Crabb and Tim Hall— all born at St. Francis—and says, “I would go back in a heartbeat.”
Mary Lee Lawyer Nichols: Nursing Class of 1952 Mary Lee Lawyer graduated from Industry High School in 1949 and St.
Francis School of Nursing in 1952. She worked at St. Francis until its 1967 closure, then at McDonough District Hospital, retiring as second-shift house supervisor in 1984.
She married Sterling “Swede” Nichols in 1952 and had two children, Cathy and Mike.
A Patient’s Story: Brenda Denise Allison One local born at St.
Francis shares a personal connection to the hospital’s staff. Born premature without a middle name, she was given the middle name “Denise” in honor of Sister Denise, who cared for her lovingly. She kept in touch with Sister Denise until her passing.
Sister Denise also helped name her brother Gerald Francis. Their grandfather was Francis Allison, and Sister Denise thought the name could also honor the hospital where he was born.
She recalls Father Bodkin (spelling uncertain) and his dog Linus visiting patients.
Her mother spent much time at the hospital, allowing her to get to know the staff well. One reason her parents preferred St. Francis over McDonough District Hospital was that children under 12 were not allowed to visit patients at MDH.
Remembering Others Who Worked or attended St. Francis and Who’s Families Reached Out to the CNB Doris Ann Norcross
(Class of 1945) of Bushnell died in a 1974 plane crash.
She was a nursing home administrator and mother of three daughters; Elaine, Joan and Nancy Georgia McCallister Douglas (Class of 1950) married a former patient, worked as a nurse in Bushnell and Avon, and raised five children; Gary, John, Cheryl, David and Tom. She died in 2010.
Jean Schmalshof Huff
(Class of 1953) worked at St. Francis, then McDonough District Hospital OB supervisor, and later Director of Nursing at The Elms Nursing Home. She died in 2019.
She was the mother of three children; Lisa Huff Wright, Terri Huff Hamm and Tim Huff.
These stories honor the legacy of St. Francis Hospital through the lives it touched and the community it served.
