“Where There’s A Will,
There’s A Way”
The Past:
in Medicine
Eva Noles
Mrs. Eva M. Noles was a Registered Nurse, a Nursing Educator, and a former Director of Nursing at Buffalo's world-renowned Roswell Park Cancer Institute. The first black nurse to train in Buffalo, Mrs. Noles has retired twice only to return to train people to provide various levels of health care.
She recalls that nursing was not always a career choice opened to blacks. In 1936, when she applied to the Buffalo City Hospital's three-year diploma nursing school, blacks were not accepted. On a dare from a friend, Mrs. Noles applied and to her surprise, was accepted.
Although she was admitted to the nursing program at the hospital that later became E.J. Meyer, and today the Erie County Medical Center, she was not fully accepted in the school and encountered many subtle forms of racial prejudice.
Prejudice did not end with her diploma from the School of Nursing. It followed her into her first years of working at her profession. As the first black staff nurse to be hired at RPMI, however, her courage and determination led her up the ladder to become a head nurse. Pushing a bit harder, she was named an instructor of nursing and then assistant director of nursing. During her last three years at RPMI, she became Director of Nursing.
Today, in addition to having earned the R.N. designation, she also holds a Bachelor of Science degree in nursing from the State University at Buffalo and the Master of Arts degree in education.
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After retiring from RPMI, Mrs. Noles worked on a federal grant to train nurse practitioners. Later joining Medical Personnel Pool as a home care supervisor, she then was named staff developer for the firm.
