Keeping it in the family: Indianapolis mom, daughters and others all worked at same hospital

INDIANAPOLIS — For one Indianapolis family, helping others runs in their blood.

A mother, her five daughters, daughter-in-law and granddaughter all worked under one roof.

The Hurrle sisters grew up at what was once St. Vincent Hospital on Fall Creek Boulevard.

Their mother, Catherine, spent her entire career with St. Vincent. It started with her graduation from nursing school in 1948 and ended with her retirement in 1992.

She juggled full-time work while raising six kids — five daughters and a son.

“It was really a big part of our life. We always were around it,” said Chris Scotten, the is the oldest of the six sisters. “It's just part of our growing up that’s just what we did.”

Scotten's sister Suzanne Engle added, “It was nothing for us to go with my dad to pick up my mom and traipse through the old hospital looking for my mom.”

When it came time to start thinking about careers, it was not a surprise the Hurrle sisters wanted to go work in a hospital like their mom.

“Healthcare is kind of the backbone to our whole family,” Scotten said.

Hurrle’s five daughters did just that: kept healthcare in the family.

Engle and second oldest sister, Beth Mahin followed directly in their mom’s footsteps. They became nurses.

“It was weird. Everybody would say where’s your mom today? And I would say, I’m sorry but you’re stuck with her daughter,” Mahin said with a laugh.

Scotten and youngest sister Barb Weimer went into finance and scheduling respectively for Ascension St. Vincent. Middle sister Janey and their sister-in-law both too came to work at the hospital at one point.

“She always had a ride to work. Sometimes we took the neighbors as well,” Weimer said of her mom.

Combined, Catherine’s five daughters and daughter-in-law have more than 100 years working for Ascension and that is before her own tenure.

“There’s just a lot of opportunity to be in healthcare and you just don’t have to be a nurse,” Engle said.

The Hurrle daughters all have different reasons as to why they decided to get into healthcare, but it always comes back to their mom, the matriarch.

“She’d be happy. She liked us working there. She bragged about it,” Mahin said.

Although Hurrle is no longer around, her girls say she would be proud.

The legacy also lived on with the next generation, as Hurrle’s granddaughter and the wife of her grandson also worked at Ascension.