Las Vegas nursing leader Kennedy Rymer dies at 94

Thursday, June 16, 2005 | 9:19 a.m.

In a Sept. 8, 1956, Sun story, Mary Kennedy Rymer was described as a "dynamic" nurse.

Her brother, Joe "Bud" Houben, says that word sure described her well.

"She had a dynamic attitude toward life," said Houben, a Las Vegas realtor. "Mary was a go-getter -- a driving force in local nursing. She was involved in a lot of activities."

Mary Catherine Kennedy Rymer, who served nine years as nursing director at Southern Nevada Memorial Hospital -- now called the University Medical Center -- and was for 20 years the visiting nurse for the local Culinary Union, died June 9 in Las Vegas. She was 94.

Services for the Las Vegas resident of 61 years will be 10 a.m. Friday at St. Viator Catholic Church, 2461 E. Flamingo Road. Viewing will be an hour before the services at that location. Interment will follow at the Southern Nevada Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Boulder City.

Kennedy Rymer was the widow of former Las Vegas Police Chief A. H. "Al" Kennedy, a military veteran who served at the Las Vegas Army Gunnery School, now Nellis Air Force Base.

She also served as president of the Nevada State Nursing Association from 1956 to 1958.

In 1973, Kennedy Rymer became an original board member of the Fitz House, a drug and alcohol treatment facility named in honor of former International Teamsters President Frank Fitzsimmons. The facility today is called WestCare.

Houben said his sister was especially proud of the work she did as visiting nurse for Culinary Union Local 226.

"Mary served as a liaison between the union, doctors and patients," he said. "She visited patients in hospitals and in their homes, making sure they got the proper benefits and treatments. A lot of the people she assisted were from low-income families."

Born Mary Houben in Ulestraten, Holland, on Nov. 24, 1910, she was the oldest of seven children of mill operator Joseph Houben and the former Mary Visschers.

The family moved to the United States when Mary was 4 and she was raised on a farm in Montana. She graduated from Columbus Hospital School of Nursing in Great Falls, Mont., in 1931.

Kennedy Rymer practiced nursing in Montana until she moved to Las Vegas in 1942. She was a nurse at what is now UMC from 1942 to 1947 and director of nurses there from 1947 until 1956.

In 1945, she married Al Kennedy, who preceded her in death in 1961. In 1973, she married railroad worker Jim Rymer, who preceded her in death in 1999.

After 55 years in nursing, Kennedy Rymer retired in 1986.

Her other accomplishments in her profession included co-founding the Southern Nevada Memorial Hospital/UMC Women's Auxiliary and the Sunrise Hospital Women's Auxiliary. She also served two terms on the State Nurses Board of Examiners and was a member of the American Nurses Association.

Kennedy Rymer was a charter member of the Las Vegas chapter of the Altrusa Club, which was founded in 1948 to promote education and international relations and support foreign exchange students. She also was a member of the Mesquite Club.

In addition to her brother, Kennedy Rymer is survived by two stepchildren, Susan Anderson and Mark Rymer; two sisters, Ceil Habets and Josephine Wilson; and two step-grandsons, Z. Donald Anderson and Aaron Maher.

The family said donations can be made in Mary Kennedy Rymer's memory to Nathan Adelson Hospice.