Helen Gessner

Helen Maletz Gessner, a recent resident of the Avalon at Bridgewater, died peacefully in her sleep on Wednesday, November 16, 2016. She was 96. Born to Mary (Wiech) and Stanislaus Maletz on December 28, 1919, in Bound Brook, she was a 1938 graduate of Bound Brook High School, and a 1941 graduate of Saint Peter’s Hospital School of Nursing. Helen became a United States Army nurse during World War II and served as a First Lieutenant in Army hospitals in Staunton, Virginia, and Bristol, England, and in a Mobile Army Surgical Hospital unit in Scotland. Her postwar nursing career was focused on obstetrics and gynecology in private practices affiliated with St. Peter University Hospital, New Brunswick. Happily, she was present at the births of many of her nieces and nephews! In 1966 she married Gerard R. Gessner, M.D., and moved to the greater Washington, D.C., area, where she lived for a decade. Widowed in 1975, Helen returned to New Jersey, residing in Bound Brook and Middlesex. She was a lifelong member of the St. Peter’s Hospital School of Nursing Alumnae Association, and the National Organization of World War Nurses. She was a communicant of both St. Mary of Czestochowa R.C. Church, Bound Brook, and Our Lady Mount Virgin R.C. Church, Middlesex. Helen was preceded in death by her six siblings, Ann (Stavish), Stanley, Henry, John, Jean (Colalillo) and Francis. Honyn, beloved aunt and great-aunt, is mourned by scores of nieces, nephews, step-children, and their families. Friends will be received at the funeral home on Saturday, November 19, 8:00 - 9:30 A.M., followed by a 10:00 A.M. Mass of Christian Burial at St. Mary of Czestochowa R.C. Church. Burial will be Saint Joseph Cemetery, Bridgewater. Memorial donations may be made to St. Peter’s School of Nursing Alumnae Association, New Brunswick, New Jersey, 08901.