Veteran Vera Shoemaker of Aurora reflects on service as U.S. Army nurse

She earned a Bronze Star among many distinctions and stopped short of becoming a colonel, because she didn't want to leave Colorado. Aurora's Vera Shoemaker -- known by all who love her as "Shoey" -- served 24 years as a nurse anesthetist with the Army.

Now approaching 95, Shoey made time to reminisce with CBS News Colorado for Veterans Day.

Serving in Army field hospitals in the Korean and Vietnam wars, Shoey saw the cost of war up close, telling us, "You learn how to share, how to take care of one another and you find out that you're not the most important person around. That there are a lot of other people that need your help." 

"Dated 30 January 1968, 7 oclock in the morning,"  Friend and caregiver Carol Wasnok reads a letter Shoey wrote in Quy Nhon at the start of the Tet Offensive, a turning point in the Vietnam War.  "I had some very critical cases yesterday. One of my patients had holes everywhere and we pumped in 38 bottles of blood and then gave him 6 more units during the night…"  And "Last night many of us sat up and we watched the flares and listened to the rockets and the mortars."  

Shoey said, "We didn't get too close to the patients because it was too difficult, you couldn't get too friendly because as soon as they were better they were shipped out." 

Vietnam was her most challenging assignment, "It was a good experience but it was a sad experience because we lost so many men," Shoey said as she teared up.  "So many of them were young American boys almost. They really weren't men. They were more like boys dying on the battlefield."  More than 58,000 American lives were lost in the Vietnam War.

Shoey made close friends in Vietnam, and brought home a companion she'd keep for 18 years.

"Mino would go to the bunker when we had to go in the bunker. But I brought home that little dog and I loved that little dog."

Going on to have a long career in real estate in Aurora, Shoey still bowls every week with two leagues, and once a year in a military tournament in Las Vegas.

"To serve my country it made me feel worthwhile.  I was doing something worthwhile. The United States of America is the greatest country in the world. That we have freedom of speech. Freedom to travel. Freedom to do what we want," Shoey said.

Vera "Shoey" Shoemaker is believed to be one of the oldest living women veterans. She'll soon be headed to San Antonio, Texas where she'll be honored for her service.