Janet Hanneman McNulty
Janet Fern Hanneman McNulty (January 17, 1936 – June 9, 2019) was an American nurse and Peace Corps volunteer who worked at a state-run mental hospital in Lahore, Pakistan, from 1962 to 1964.
She grew up on a Kansas farm and in Junction City, the daughter of Frank William Hanneman and Lydia Ellen Vonada Hanneman. She earned a nursing degree at the University of Kansas in 1958, then trained in psychiatric nursing in England at Maudsley Hospital and studied psychology in New Zealand on a Rotary Foundation fellowship.
In 1961 she became one of the Peace Corps’ first nurses. After training in Puerto Rico and learning Urdu, she served in Lahore, where she helped improve hospital care. She survived several accidents and illnesses during her service, including bicycle crashes, malaria, and hepatitis. Her work helped make the Peace Corps more visible and she became a symbol of the program, being mentioned in a Sargent Shriver speech, appearing in a Peace Corps publicity film, and being featured in a 1965 Life magazine article about the return experience of volunteers.
After her service, she worked as a Peace Corps recruiter and gave interviews and lectures around the world. She married James McNulty in 1965. She died on June 9, 2019, in Laguna Woods, California. Her husband later established a nursing scholarship in her memory.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 08:27 (CET).