Interview of retired U.S. Army Colonel Lola Olsmith on her service in the 
Army Nurse Corps during the Vietnam War and Operation Desert Storm


Ruth Stewart:	[00:05] Lola Olsmith is being interviewed today as a member of the Women's Overseas Service League, uh, San Antonio, Texas Unit. Today is January 15, 2004. We are recording at the Army Residence Community in San Antonio, Texas. Ruth Stewart is interviewer, assisted by Carol Habgood.

	[00:30] Lola, start in by telling us a little bit about your early life.

Lola Olsmith:	Well, I was born in Bee Branch, Arkansas in 1935. Uh, we were poor farmers and, um, my folks moved after a year, when I was 1 year old, they moved to California where we stayed for about 8 y-, ‘til I was 8 years old, then we came back to Arkansas and that’s where I went to school and, uh, graduated from high school, at Bee Branch. And from there, I had decided, uh, that I wanted to be a nurse and follow in the footsteps of an aunt who had previously graduated. And so I went to the same school she did in Little Rock, Arkansas. I went to St. Vincent Infirmary. It was a 3-year diploma school.

	Following that, I, uh, worked for the VA Hospital in Little Rock and later I transferred to Atlanta, Georgia, looking for more excitement, of course. And, uh, I worked there for the VA Hospital. And then, uh, just looking for more excitement, I decided that, uh, after seeing an ad on TV one day about the army needing nurses, I decided to myself, “Well, I could do that!” But I went to the air force recruiter and asked for, um, if, if they sent nurses to Vietnam. And he says, “No, but I think the army does.” So I then went to the army and they asked me if I had 10 friends who wanted to go with me.

Ruth Stewart:	[2:30] They were eager!

Lola Olsmith:	So that’s how, how I got to the, to the army.

Ruth Stewart:	[2:39] Okay. And how did you get started then in the army?

Lola Olsmith:	Well…

Ruth Stewart:	[02:44] Was it difficult for you?

Lola Olsmith:	No, I was a little older than most, uh, most of the other women who joined at that time, ‘cause so many of’m were out of nursing school, directly out of nursing school, and then some were coming out of the army’s, uh, RAIN Program so they were all – I had a little more experience than most of’m – and, uh, came here, uh, to San Antonio to, for my, uh, basic orientation with a, with a, supposed to have an assignment, interim assignment. I had a guaranteed assignment to Vietnam, [how naïve 3:30], and, uh, I was supposed to go to Fort Ord, California for the interim and, uh, but 2 weeks before we graduated from basic, uh, they called 13 of us nurses aside and told us we were going directly to Vietnam. And that’s when I started [laughter] getting chills [laughter] up and down my spine [laughter]. But, um, we, we had, um, we stuck together.

So, uh, we had our assignment to, to, uh, travel to Vietnam. The 13 of us were, uh, together. And, uh, we went out of, um, what was the air force base you told me a while ago, out of San Francisco, um, I don’t know. Anyway, uh, we got on the plane and we were traveling by commercial plane, of course, and, uh, there the 13 of us were on a plane full of men, all going to Vietnam. That was sort of a weird feeling. And, uh, it was a long trip. We stopped once in Japan. We weren’t allowed to get off the plane. Then we stopped in Okinawa and we were, we were able to get off the plane at that point for a short time. And then when we landed in, uh, Saigon it was like midnight and, uh, you’d look out the window – you could just imagine all kinds of things going on. But we landed at Tan Son Nhut and we went into this little building where we were treated to canned Cokes and canned Cokes were very unusual in 1967. [laughter] It was my first time to see that! [laughter]

So then we stayed there through New Year’s Eve, ‘cause it was New Year’s Day that we traveled upcountry to our new, uh, assignment.

Ruth Stewart:	[5:53] And when you hit your new assignment, what was, what was it like and what was your reaction?

Lola Olsmith:	Well, we had met with the chief nurse at the Replacement Center and, um, of course, she let us know that we were needed and, uh, everybody was looking forward to [coughing] being there, coming in. And when we, um, walked into the Replacement Center, um, the hospital – I guess I, I didn’t have any idea what to expect. When I first thought about it, I didn’t expect to have flushed toilets or hot, running water ‘cause we thought people were, the nurses were living in tents and, but, at this particular place they had built, uh, built the hooches. It was built in a triangle, you know, I mean a quadrangle.

Ruth Stewart:	[6:58] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	And, uh, [throat clearing] and there were 2, 2 people to a room. Um, and we did have hot and cold running water and we did have flushed johns so I was very surprised to, at the accommodations that we had that much. Now, the hospital was Quonset huts, you know, rows of Quonset huts with, with covered, uh, walkways between’m. And, uh, found out there’s, there were 2 hospitals in this particular village where, where I went and it was in Quy Nhon, which was about, it was on the coast, about halfway in mid-country, halfway up the coast. And, uh, one of the nurses in this group was, had been my roommate in basic and we thought we were going to the same hospital, well, we’d asked to go to the same hospital. Well, we were put in the 2 hospitals in the same village and it turned out, uh, the whole year I was there, I think I saw her one time that whole time. Of course, you, you’d soon meet up with, with the people you work with and, and that becomes your family.

Ruth Stewart:	[8:25] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	The, the chief nurse was very nice. She told us that her policy was to, that every nurse that came in, since our hospital had a prisoner ward, that we worked in the prisoner ward for 2 weeks to begin with. And, which I did. And it was at that point, um, that I became disenchanted with the war, I guess. Before that, I was very dovish, I mean hawkish on the whole thing but once I saw the prisoners and, you know, found out they were just people like us and they were just, uh, serving whoever fed them, that was my impression. That whoever brought the food in, that was who they would serve. Of course, that’s, that’s a long way from politics [laughter]. That was just down at the very basic level.

Ruth Stewart:	[9:34] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	But then I, uh, following that, I went to the, um, recovery and, uh, surgical intensive care ward, which was combined and we took care of all the post-surgery patients and kept the, the sicker ones. And that was GIs and prisoners alike. We took care of everybody. Um, lots of different experiences there. We worked 12-hour shifts. It, we would work, uh, 7 to 7 at night for a while and then we’d switch and work the day shift for a while. And, most of the time, we were able to get 2 days off a week, even though we were working these 12-hour shifts, ‘til it got to a crunch time and then we had to, we were lucky to get a day off then. I was there during Tet in1968. And, uh, that was rather exciting. There was no, not any active fighting in this village where we were. It was mostly out in what we called the valley from us. And, also the ROK, the, uh, the Korean Army was stationed out in the, in the valley and the, the scuttlebutt was that the Vietnamese were so afraid of the Koreans that, that we were safe, you know, [laughter] because they were between us and the enemy. [laughter] But during Tet, um, there was a, an assault made on the radio, local radio station.

Ruth Stewart:	[11:33] Which was American military?

Lola Olsmith:	Not, um, I, no, I had the impression it was a Vietnamese radio station. Now, the Americans’, uh, um, communication equipment and everything was on a big, high mountain right behind us and that was one of the things that they were trying to do is get up the mountain and, uh, destroy the communication. But we, we had helicopters coming right over the quadrangle where we lived, shooting into the mountain [inaudible 12:10] during Tet.

Ruth Stewart:	[12:18] But that was the closest from, as far as…

Lola Olsmith:	As far, as far as my experience, yes.

Ruth Stewart:	[12:25] Mm-hm. Mm-hm. But you got casualties from all of that.

Lola Olsmith:	Mm-hm. We did. And, um, I never had to work in the emergency room. I don’t know if I could’ve handled that very well or not. At least when I got the patients they were, they had gone through surgery and that was – of course, that was traumatic, too, ‘cause a lot of young men waking up with lost limbs, uh, it was pretty traumatic. And, um, things were quiet during that year, you know, it wasn’t always real intense. We, we would do what we called med caps. We’d go out to the village and just do like a sick call for any, anybody who wanted to come in.

Ruth Stewart:	[13:25] What’d you call it?

Lola Olsmith:	Med cap.

Ruth Stewart:	[13:28] Mid, M-I-D?

Lola Olsmith:	Med, M-E-D. Medical civilian, I’m not sure what it means. Medical civilian aid or…

Ruth Stewart:	[13:35] Assistance?

Lola Olsmith:	…assistance, or something like that.

Ruth Stewart:	[13:37] Okay. Sorta like a clinic…

Lola Olsmith:	Mm-hm.

Ruth Stewart:	[13:41] …an on-the-spot clinic.

Lola Olsmith:	Right. And we also visited the orphanages and, uh, [inaudible 13:50].

Ruth Stewart:	[13:50] Tell me more about this med cap experience. Think of one day that you went out there and what it was like and the people that you saw.

Lola Olsmith:	Well, and we also visited the, the, the leprosarium but, which was, you know, not too far away. But one med cap that I remember, we went into a fishing village and we walked, it was very close to the water. We walked through all these little huts, you know, and we finally, it seemed like there was a porch there and that’s where we set up, um, we had our, our equipment and, um, all set up on this porch, uncovered, and the doctor was there and if he wanted to listen to somebody’s chest, you know, he would, it was just no table or chairs or anything. It was just the porch.

Ruth Stewart:	[14:50] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	And it, it was very, uh, superficial coverage, as far as what we could do.

Ruth Stewart:	[15:01] What kind of conditions were you looking at there? Or that appeared before you.

Lola Olsmith:	Yeah. It seems to me like it was mostly, um, skin conditions and things like that. I really don’t remember much else.

Ruth Stewart:	[15:22] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	I don’t remember taking any patients back with us or, uh, I’m not sure exact-, how extensive that was. I just don’t remember if there was follow-up or not. And then when we went to the, uh, leprosarium, the highlight of that was lunch. [laughter]

Ruth Stewart:	[15:47] [laughter] They fed you well?

Lola Olsmith:	Oh, yes! The French nuns were very good to us. [laughter] And, um, and I don’t remember – I’m sure the, they, the nuns were asking for, for, uh, certain things for their certain patients but I don’t remember anything about that.

Ruth Stewart:	[16:14] Did you do something while you were there or were you just observing?

Lola Olsmith:	Mostly observing and looking around. But they had just like a village, you know, everybody with their separate little houses and everything and it was very beautiful because it was right on the beach and there were bougainvilleas, you know, and beautiful, uh, shrubbery and trees. It was, it was just beautiful.

Ruth Stewart:	[16:42] So, as part of your Army Nurse Corps duties in Vietnam, you were being a diplomat, too.

Lola Olsmith:	She would say that. Yes, because, another incident, we took care civilians and we got this young man in, uh, who had been a victim of an attempted assassion-, assassination. And he had been shot into the mouth, uh, through the mouth someway, and he was bleeding. Well, the Vietnamese didn’t have the capacity to, to give, uh, collect blood and give it so, uh, he required several, uh, blood transfusions because of the bleeding in his mouth. And I became friends with his sister and I sort of got the feeling they were fairly well-to-do people, um, because of his intention to be a, um, like a mayor of a village.

Ruth Stewart:	[17:46] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	He was being groomed for that. And, uh, I was invited to their, to their home, uh, on one occasion for a, for a dinner. And that was quite, uh…

Ruth Stewart:	[18:06] Very interesting.

Lola Olsmith:	…interesting to, to do that.

Ruth Stewart:	[18:09] What did they feed you?

Lola Olsmith:	I can remember, uh, shrimp, um, boiled eggs, I remember, and vegetables, but I don’t remember what kind. Fruit was always, always very good there. Pineapple was delicious. But the shrimp is the main thing I remember.

Ruth Stewart:	[18:36] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	And, uh, and I, we tried to correspond a little bit after I left the country but it was almost impossible to get mail back and forth at that time.

Ruth Stewart:	[18:53] Mm-hm. Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith: 	And, um, I’m trying to think of…

Ruth Stewart:	[18:59] Were you at that same location throughout your Vietnamese tour?

Lola Olsmith:	Yes. Our hospital was moving right as I was leaving, it was going, uh, going to go upcountry from there.

Ruth Stewart:	[19:14] How long were you there then?

Lola Olsmith:	Uh, almost a full year. Just a half a month short of a year. I went on R&R twice. And, uh, that was sort of, uh, a difference experience, too. Um, went to Australia the first time and, uh, the nurse that went with me we were, got there on a Sunday and nothing was open. We finally wound up going to a movie but it wasn’t near where our hotel was. And we went downtown for a movie and coming back we, uh, caught a taxi. Well, as soon as we got in the taxi and started talking to the driver, he knew instantly that we were American and he said, “Oh! R&R girls!” [laughter] He says, “We’re used to R&R boys, but we don’t get R&R girls.” [laughter] And, uh, so he insisted when we got back to the hotel, he turned the motor off and we sat there and talked for a good length of time and then he insisted that his family take us sightseeing. And he and his wife and, uh, 1 or 2 children, I can’t remember, came the next day and took us, uh, sightseeing up the coast and went and took us to the zoo. It was just unbelievable and they kept wanting to do more and more for us and they finally, we were trying to get out [laughter], you know, and they insisted, “Well, come have tea with us.” Well, we thought tea and that would be it. [laughter] We learned our lesson! Turned out tea was, of course, dinner.

Ruth Stewart:	[21:15] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	Yeah. But they were very nice to us. Very gracious.

Ruth Stewart:	[21:22] Where was your other R&R, then?

Lola Olsmith:	It was to Hong Kong, which was a very exciting city! Lots of shopping. [laughter] That was fun, too.

Ruth Stewart:	[21:37] Did you have any of the kind of experiences with local people that you did in Australia?

Lola Olsmith:	No. No, I did not. They were just hustling to, to make you anything you wanted made. [laughter]

Ruth Stewart:	[21:54] Yeah.

Lola Olsmith:	Suits, shoes, anything – dresses. [laughter]

Ruth Stewart:	[22:01] So actually, overall, in your experience in Vietnam, um, you said you really virtually turned from being a hawk to a dove there. Did that remain with you throughout that?

Lola Olsmith:	Um, I felt that we were fighting a losing war. That’s just what I felt like, in that we were not giving it what we needed to to win the war.

Ruth Stewart:	[22:33] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	One thing about it, though, coming back, I’ve heard so many people talk about the bad experiences they had on coming back to the States from Vietnam. I never had that. Uh, I was always cautious, of course, but, um, when I got back, uh, I was at Letterman and I, uh, worked there in thoracic surgery and cardiovascular surgery. I did that for a short time and it was another thrilling experience for me and I kept thinking, “What am I gonna do after this?” I just felt like the, the freedom in nursing that we had in, uh, Vietnam and then, then the experience at Letterman, I just, I felt like that, uh, anything from there would just, would just be a letdown. And, uh, so I went on recruiting at that point. And I was visiting, uh, mostly visiting, uh, nursing schools in, uh, northern California. And I, I had, uh, fi-, I showed films about nursing in Vietnam and generally it was well-accepted. I know one time, in particular, that one student got very upset over the, the film. It bothered her because of some of the surgery that was being done.

Ruth Stewart:	[24:20] It showed the actual surgery?

Lola Olsmith:	Yes. Mm-hm. It was the removal of a bullet from an eye. Um, but we were very proud of military medicine in Vietnam. The word at that time was, if a soldier made it back to the hospital, less than 1% died and we really thought that was – we were proud of, of what we were doing, medically speaking.

Ruth Stewart:	[25:10] And you still feel like it was very well done? What you were doing there?

Lola Olsmith:	Oh yeah, oh yeah.

Ruth Stewart:	[25:16] Overall, it was very good.

Lola Olsmith:	Um, I thought the medical care was terrific! And, and the people who really fought under, under, uh, duress and bombing conditions, you know, the people who were fired upon…

Ruth Stewart:	[25:36] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	…um, really, they were all just outstanding. One, one experience going back to my early, uh, days in-country during Tet, um, one night I was, I was on night duty and, uh, there came a great explosion and it was just rocked everything and it blew the, the, uh, electrical outlets, uh, cords out of the outlets in the wall. It was so tremendous. Well, we, of course, thought we were under attack. We later found out though it was a, somebody got into the ammunition, uh, dump and blew it up. And it was several miles away but it was a horrendous…

Ruth Stewart:	[26:31] It was an enemy action?

Lola Olsmith:	Yes. Uh, and I was so scared I, uh, we had to throw thin mattresses under the beds. You know, we had the tall beds. We threw thin mattresses under the bed and would put the patient under the bed for protection. I lifted a, a Vietnamese lady, pregnant lady. Of course, she wasn’t a big lady but I lifted her by myself. I went down on one knee and stuck her under the bed. I was [laughter], my adrenaline was so high [laughter]. The next day, my legs were so sore I couldn’t bel-, [laughter], I could hardly walk [laughter] from, just from that action.

Ruth Stewart:	[27:23] But your back survived.

Lola Olsmith:	Yes, I did. My back did survive, yes. Another thing, at the time I was, um, I was, uh, suctioning a patient, I think, in the recovery room. A patient had a trach and, of course, those things came out of the wall and, uh, we had to makeshift there. [laughter] Um, that was about the biggest experience from, during Tet. From that…So where would you like me to go to now?

Ruth Stewart:	[28:07] Well then, you were in Vietnam about a year…

Lola Olsmith:	Mm-hm.

Ruth Stewart:	[28:11] …and then you went back to Letterman…

Lola Olsmith:	Mm-hm.

Ruth Stewart:	[28:13] …and, um, how long were you there?

Lola Olsmith:	I was there a little over a year. And then I…

Ruth Stewart:	[28:19] Was that the extent of your tour in, or your air f-, army experience? Or did you stay in the army?

Lola Olsmith:	I stayed. Uh, then I went on recruiting from there and I was assigned in the San Francisco area and I stayed, I stayed there on recruit, recruiting for, army nurse recruiting, for a little less than a year and then, um, a position opened up in Atlanta, Georgia, which is where I was living when I joined the army. And, uh, uh, to be the coordinator of the nurse recruiting for 9 southern states and Puerto Rico, so that’s where I went next. And that, of course, was at the draw down and, and eventually the, the end of the war in Vietnam, ‘cause we were getting out of that country. And, of course, it was the cut down on, in military, um, personnel, too.

Ruth Stewart:	[29:27] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	And, uh, so I told you earlier I graduated from a, uh, diploma school. I had been going to night school because I had the time there and, uh, catching up on some, uh, required courses before and then I applied to go full time to, uh, to get my undergraduate degree and I was accepted at Medical College of Georgia so…

Ruth Stewart:	[30:01] Was this with the army?

Lola Olsmith:	I was still in the army, mm-hm. And I was able to go there and, within a year, I got my degree.

Ruth Stewart:	[30:16] Bachelor of Science in nursing?

Lola Olsmith:	Mm-hm. BSS.

Ruth Stewart:	[30:23] Okay. So then did you stay in the army a little while longer after that?

Lola Olsmith:	I did. From there, uh, I came back to San Antonio for the, for the advanced course and, um, which was, was a 6-month course. That was 1975, the beginning – January through June – and it was one of those very mild winters in San Antonio and I just thought this was the most wonderful place in the world. [laughter] And I said, “This is where I want to live!” [laughter] And, uh, from there, then, after completing the course, I went to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. I stayed at Fort Leonard Wood for, um, 2 years and I was the head nurse on a general surgery ward for part of it and head nurse in the, uh, emergency room for part of it. And I was still, um, undecided about what I really wanted to do and, uh, and looking for the next assignment; they offered me recruiting again. I went to, uh, to Fort Meade, Maryland, uh, where I stayed for 2 years and I was, again, the coordinator of nurse recruiting. And, at that point, I decided that I wanted to get back to San Antonio. So I resigned my commission – I resigned from active duty, I did not resign my commission. Resigned from active duty and transferred into a, uh, the, to the 94th General Hospital here in San Antonio.

Ruth Stewart:	[32:37] In the reserve?

Lola Olsmith:	In the reserve.

Ruth Stewart:	[32:40] And what year was that?

Lola Olsmith:	1979. ‛79, yes. It’s unbelievable! [laughter]

Ruth Stewart:	[32:52] So how, how many years were you in the active duty?

Lola Olsmith:	I was, I was on active duty for 12 years and, uh, I went into the reserves as a major, by that time. And I stayed with the reserves and, and, um, retired as a full colonel.

Ruth Stewart:	[33:19] So how many years were you in the reserves then?

Lola Olsmith:	12 years.

Ruth Stewart:	[33:22] Oh, 12 in active and 12 in…

Lola Olsmith:	Mm-hm. Yeah.

Ruth Stewart:	[33:24] Okay.

Lola Olsmith:	And then that’s when, um, Desert Storm came along and our hospital was active, uh, activated and we were sent to Germany. Our whole, uh, the whole hospital personnel, where we were just scattered throughout the country, you know, just assigned to different hospitals throughout because we were expecting the, the injured out of, uh, out of Saudi Arabia to come back through Germany.

Ruth Stewart:	[34:03] Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	And that’s what we were expecting. And then we were very [meaningful 34:08] in, in the Germany because they had depleted the hospitals there with, from military personnel. Medical personnel, they sent them to the desert, ahead, before we got there. And, uh, so they were really needing, uh, more personnel there.

Ruth Stewart:	[34:31] And your experience in Germany then was how long?

Lola Olsmith:	We stayed there 4 months. Uh, it was January to April. It was very cold. [laughter] I just…

Ruth Stewart:	[34:44] And what year was that?

Lola Olsmith:	‛91.

Ruth Stewart:	[34:47] Of what year?

Lola Olsmith:	1991.

Ruth Stewart:	[34:49] ‛91.

Lola Olsmith:	Uh-huh.

Ruth Stewart:	[34:53] Okay. And your experience in that kind of a situation, in the Gulf War, um, how did that compare to Vietnam, in terms of your own feelings about it or your own response to it?

Lola Olsmith:	Well, I think it was totally different. Of course, the country, it was totally different for the country, too. And we were just very thankful that, that we didn’t see the casualties that we were, could’ve seen.

Ruth Stewart:	[35:30] You didn’t get many of the casualties then at all?

Lola Olsmith:	Mm-hm. I think I saw one.

Ruth Stewart:	[35:35] You were really just staffing the routine things.

Lola Olsmith:	That’s right. We, we just were there. We, uh, I think the civilian personnel were very happy to see us – dependents, I’m talking about, not personnel. Civilian dependents were very grateful that we were there because their care had been cut down drastically.

Ruth Stewart:	[36:01] Mm-hm. Mm-hm.

Lola Olsmith:	So, I re-, we returned back home and, um, I had planned on retiring before we ever knew we were gonna be activated. That, we got back in, uh, May, the 1st of May, and by the, by November, I had re-, retired from a reserve unit.

Ruth Stewart:	[36:34] Mm-hm. In reflecting on your military career, do y-, what do you feel that you gave to the military and that the military gave to you?

Lola Olsmith:	Well, uh, I’d like to talk about what the military gave to me. Uh, I was, uh, being a diploma graduate, I was very unsure of my, uh, capabilities and what I could do. I felt like I, I was just a nurse, you know, that’s the way I felt. But, after being in the military and having so many different experiences, I just, it, it was, uh, gave me more confidence and assurance, uh, than I could ever, ever dream about. It was really good for me. And I, in turn, I think I gave, uh, all I could to, uh, to my duties and, uh, responsibilities. But I was, I was very grateful for, for what it did for me.

Ruth Stewart:	[37:57] Mm-hm. What were the specific highlights, not necessarily dramatic ones, but what stands out in your memory when somebody asks you about your experience in the military? It might have been Vietnam or it might not.

Lola Olsmith:	Um, hm. I’m not sure. I, I really, uh, don’t know how to answer that. I’m just, uh, very proud to be part of it and, uh, but as far as any one incident, I can’t, I really can’t think of anything.

Ruth Stewart:	[39:02] Okay. Since you left the reserves, have you joined any veterans’ organizations?

Lola Olsmith:	Well, [laughter] I think the, the, uh, Overseas Service League is my first experience with, uh, with joining another organization. And, um, I’m finding that very interesting, that, uh, being able to, to work with wonderful ladies that I’m meeting there.

Ruth Stewart:	[39:40] And what do you do besides, then, um, with your life now that you’re out of the military, out of the reserves?

Lola Olsmith:	Mm-hm. I probably spent most of my time, um, with my community, with my neighborhood. I, um, joined the, uh, our homes association and I served as president on it for 4 years and I’m still active with it as the secretary and, uh, uh, doing different things with it. And that’s probably my biggest, more time consuming than anything else I do. Trying, trying, promoting membership in that and…

Ruth Stewart:	[40:30] Mm-hm. Is there anything else that you would like to say about your experience or your feelings or your, um, contacts in the military or since then that you’d like to add in now?

Lola Olsmith:	Well, once you’ve been in the military, uh, there’s a ver-, there’s a closeness there that, uh, you don’t experience anywhere else and, uh, even when I was in Vietnam, and, uh, the feelings that, that, that the whole group had, we knew that it wouldn’t last, you know, that once we got back to the real world that, uh, that we wouldn’t, uh, experience that anymore. And, uh, but likewise, uh, you have that on a similar way with the people that you work with or assigned with in the military. And I think it’s even more so now that, when you meet up with people that, that you’ve, uh, shared common interests with.

Ruth Stewart:	[41:44] The bond is still there.

Lola Olsmith:	Yeah. Mm-hm.

Ruth Stewart:	[41:47] Mm-hm. Well, we really appreciate you taking time to do this with us, Lola, and to add this bit of history to that of our country, the military, the women in the military, and nursing.

Lola Olsmith:	Well, I hope it will be useful.

Ruth Stewart:	[42:05] Thank you.


/ab