Gene R. Jerabek was born in Winfield, Pennsylvania in December 1917. She grew up on a farm. They had electricity in the house, but they did not have an indoor toilet. Her father taught school for a while. They moved from Winfield to the country. It was a regular small farm with cattle, some horses, and mules. They had a man that came out and picked up the milk. One night there was an auto accident outside their house. She worked for a doctor for about three years after high school. The doctor brought some of the people involved in the accident to her house. This is when she decided she wanted to train to be a nurse. She went to Jefferson Medical School in Philadelphia [Annotator's Note: now the Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]. She had to take an exam in Harrisburg the capital of Pennsylvania. She passed. When she first started work, she was in the chest department in the training area. The doctor there asked her to think about the Army Nurse Corps. She applied and was accepted. She heard about the attack [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941], but it did not mean much to her because she was in a different part of the world. She went to basic training outside of Atlanta [Annotator's Note: Atlanta, Georgia]. They set up tents, but not the hospital. About 10 days later they set up the hospital. She applied to be moved to a field hospital. There were eight units. This was on the front lines. She took an English ship across the ocean. She learned how to play poker while onboard. When she went into the service, she became a Second Lieutenant immediately.

Gene R. Jerabek [Annotator's Note: a lieutenant in the US Army Nurse Corps] went overseas to Italy [Annotator's Note: Caserta, Italy with the 8th Evacuation Hospital]. The food they had was what they had in England, and it was good. She loved anchovies for breakfast. The ship they were on was English, but they never went to England. She had a routine. They got up and had breakfast then they had exercised. When they got to Africa, they did not set up the hospital. She was in Oran [Annotator's Note: Oran, Algeria]. One day they got dressed up and had their pictures taken for the hospital unit. From there they moved to Italy. They followed the Army. The evacuation hospitals followed the Army. The first unit was as close to the front lines as it could be. After the battle was over, they would collect the wounded. She was a nurse. It was like being a mother. Sometimes she worked in the OR [Annotator's Note: operating room] and sometimes she worked in the ward. It depended on what she was assigned to do. Normally there was a distance between them and the front even if they were the closest unit. She remembers following one group and they went up on a high hill. On top of the hill, there were still dead Germans. They did experience bombings in Italy. The hospital tent had a big red cross on it, and they would get bombed every night. Their food was made where the unit was. Everyone had their mess kit, and they went down the line and took what they wanted to eat. At the end of the line, there was an Italian woman in an apron that would wait for people to give scraps from their mess kits. From there, they moved to Aversa [Annotator's Note: Aversa, Italy] where she got to be in the evacuation hospital. The first hospital got the people with the worst injuries, and then the next got some, and so on. When they moved out the second hospital went first, and the first hospital stayed until the last hospital moved. And they continued this rotation. The evacuation unit was the same as a field hospital. They would do first aid or a little bit more so the people could travel. The next day the ambulance would take people back to a regular hospital. The first hospital she worked for ended up becoming a permanent hospital for prisoners. She saw some things that were difficult to understand. They would be in one spot for about two days and then they would move.

Gene R. Jerabek's [Annotator's Note: a lieutenant in the US Army Nurse Corps with the 8th Evacuation Hospital] husband was overseas before she was. He was on one side of Italy, and she was on the other. He was in the engineers, and he would go get supplies. Anytime he was in the area he would go and see her. They knew each other before the war. His unit ended up staying there. Her unit moved with the hospital. He suggested they get married while they were in Italy, and she was okay with the idea. They got married right outside his unit. The chaplain that was supposed to marry them got held up at sea, so the base chaplain had to marry them. They set up a boxcar with some white sheets and they had a little chair for them to sit on. Italy had to okay the wedding and so did their officers. She had to get permission from her commander Mark Clark [Annotator's Note: US Army Lieutenant General Mark Wayne Clark]. They were married and went on their honeymoon. Then she had to go back with her unit on the line. She made it as far as Lake Desenzano [Annotator's Note: Lake Garda in Desenzano del Garda, Italy] and she had enough points [Annotator's Note: a point system was devised based on a number of factors that determined when American servicemen serving overseas could return home] to make it home. Her husband was still in Italy and was preparing to go to Japan. She was in the United States when the war ended. She came back to New Jersey. She was in the 8th Evac [Annotator's Note: 8th Evacuation Hospital]. When Japan signed the peace treaty [Annotator's Note: Surrender ceremony; 2 September 1945 aboard USS Missouri (BB-63), Tokyo Bay, Japan], her husband got to go home. She was discharged in New Jersey and then went home to Pennsylvania. She stayed with her parents. When her husband got discharged, he came there as well. Then they moved to Illinois.

After the war, Gene R. Jerabek moved to Julian [Annotator's Note: Julian, Illinois]. Her husband's work saved his job for him. She stayed home. Her first child was born in 1946. She would do some nursing every once in while in a doctor's office. They had five children. She did not use the GI Bill [Annotator's Note: the G.I. Bill, or Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, was enacted by the United States Congress to aid United States veterans of World War 2 in transitioning back to civilian life and included financial aid for education, mortgages, business starts and unemployment] because she already had her education in nursing. She loved the Honor Flight [Annotator's Note: a national network of independent Hubs working together to honor our nation's veterans with an all-expenses paid trip to the National Mall in Washington, D.C. to visit the war memorials]. She went in May 2011. She worked at home with her family. They had a house and a garden. They moved to Juliet [Annotator's Note: Juliet, Illinois] where they both retired and then moved to Kingman, Arizona in 1977. Her husband died in 1986. Then she moved to Atlanta [Annotator's Note: Atlanta, Georgia]. There were times when she got bombed in Italy [Annotator's Note: as a lieutenant in the US Army Nurse Corps]. She was glad to come home. Getting married in Italy was fun. She got to fly out of Aversa [Annotator's Note: Aversa, Italy] to New Jersey. She got to throw a flare out of the plane when they were over the ocean. She thinks history might be boring for some people. She was interested in everything they were doing in the United States.