NAHANT — The Jesmond Nursing and Rehabilitative Care celebrated the 100th birthday of resident Lina Wasenskaja and the 103rd birthday of resident Kenneth Gavin Friday morning.
Wasenskaja’s daughter Maria Stanley said Wasenskaja has been living in Nahant for around 10 years. But before coming to town she lived a long, storied life. Her story starts in 1923 in the Russian town of Staraya Russa, according to an informational packet on her life.
“The family soon moved to Petrograd (later Leningrad, now St. Petersburg) and settled in a large apartment shared with seven other families,” the information packet said. “They shared the same kitchen and two bathrooms.”
During this time in the Soviet Union, the children of formerly wealthy families were prohibited from higher education.
“Lina’s father belonged to that category and made earning at the timber transport down Ural River during summers – the industry previously owned by his family,” the packet said. “They were very poor… Lina remembered she had just one dress – a simple cotton dress at her last year of school.”
Wasenskaja graduated from high school in 1941.
“She had an acting portfolio ready for acceptance to the theatre school, which included wins in poetry reciting competitions which she particularly cherished,” the packet said.
When the Nazi army sieged Leningrad on September 8, 1941, her plans changed because Leningrad Theatre Institute had been evacuated.
“The medical school remained, and Lina went to med school under the insistence from her mother, who was horrified that her daughter might end up without higher education, given her husband’s plight,” the packet said.
The first few weeks of school ended up being just an intense nursing course and certification. The school then closed.
The packet said that some time later, Wasenskaja found an ad for a nurse at a newly opened orphanage.
In order to get the job, Wasenskaja lied and said she was a third-year medical student. She was 18 at the time.
“They did not tell her she would be doing it all by herself — accepting hungry and wounded children (the horror of daily city bombing was already in full swing); treating, feeding, clothing them; and preparing them for the dangerous transport of the city, ordering materials and whatever scarce food they were able to deliver,” the packet said.
During this time her home was damaged by a bomb, her father had passed away, and her mother had moved in with relatives in order to survive.
“Lina lived at the orphanage with the kids. She was awarded medals for Defense of Leningrad and for Valiant Labor During War,” the packet said.
Eventually, a new medical school opened and invited Wasenskaja to study there. She earned her medical diploma in 1945 and married a Naval Academy graduate. They had a child and lived on a military base on the Baltic shore in Latvia.
“There she worked as a family doctor, which included paying home visits to lighthouses in cold stormy winters,” the packet said. “She later changed her specialization to clinical lab and hematology, and treated children with leukemia.”
After her husband served 15 years in Latvia, Wasenskaja returned to Leningrad, where she worked in major hospitals in the city.
“When she was permitted to leave the Soviet Union in 1982 and reunited with her daughter after six years of being apart, at 58, she decided to leave medicine behind,” the packet said. “She cleaned people’s houses (and told great stories about people she enjoyed meeting) and worked at a fancy boutique in New York knitting sweaters.”
Wasenskaja then moved to Boston and enrolled in the English program at Baker Hill College, where she worked as a librarian.
“In retirement, she was an active member of a Russian immigrant science society, where she presented her research on the topic of Mozart’s health for Mozart’s 300th birthday commemoration,” the packet said. “She loved Boston, loved her street in Brookline in Spring when so much was blooming … enjoyed her many friends, and of course her family.”
Kenneth Gavin served in the United States Air Force during World War Two, according to nahant.org. Last year on his birthday, President Joe Biden specially recognized and thanked him for his service.
“The selflessness of veterans like you who answered our nation’s call to serve during World War II defines the true character of our Greatest Generation,” Biden’s letter said.
Gavin was in active duty from 1942 to 1945 and went into the Air Force Reserve in 1958, according to his son Jack Gavin. After he retired, he became an air traffic controller for the Federal Aviation Administration.
Throughout his military career he piloted C47s with the 437 Transport Group, had a role in the invasion of Normandy on D-Day, was involved in Operation Market Garden, and flew over Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge.
In an interview with The Item in 2019, he described his experience in Operation Market Garden, an Allied military operation in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands in September 1944.
“We lived day to day,” Gavin said. “It was a case of luck. A lot of guys didn’t make it.”
Ed Manzano of American Legion Post 215 Nahant gave a presentation for Gavin at the celebration Friday.
Both Wasenskaja and Gavin were surrounded by family, community members, staff from Jesmond Nursing and Rehabilitative Care, and government officials for the celebration.
In attendance were Massachusetts State Senator Brendan Crighton (D-Lynn) and State Rep. Peter Capano, to give both residents citations from the state Senate.
The citations extended its “best wishes for continued success” to Gavin and Wasenskaja.
