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200 birthday for Mother Bickerdyke next week

Galesburg native, and highly influential war-time nurse Mother Mary Ann Bickerdyke’s 200th birthday celebration is coming up on Wednesday.

Bickerdyke is known for serving on 19 battlefields, securing better food for soldiers, and – after becoming an attorney – helped Civil War veterans receive pensions.

In her time, women weren’t considered nurses but that didn’t deter Mother Bickerdyke. Joan Larson told WGIL of the horrors she experience when serving the Union in Cairo, Illinois. Saying, ” When she went down there she saw this big hill. And as she got closer and closer she saw it was a pile of limbs that had been amputated – arms and legs. She knew then this is were God had sent her, and what she was supposed to do.”

Pam Johnson, who portrays Mother Bickerdyke at many community events, talks of the importance she had on the battlefield saying, “It was a different time. Clean food, clean water, good clean clothing and fresh air – she believed in that. That was not an opinion of doctors back then and so she ran into a lot of problems with surgeons and doctors on the battlefield.”

Johnson will be in character at the Galeburg Public Library on the 19th at 4 P-M were visitors can meet and talk with her.

The birthday celebration ice cream social will kick off at 5 P-M at Standish Park in Galesburg.

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