Love hurt the kingdom’s health service when Cupid’s arrow landed as soon as the kingdom struck oil and attracted workers who wooed the nurses and medics.

In the 1930s and 1940s, the American Mission Hospital (AMH) in Bahrain struggled with a shortage of qualified and trained staff.

The problem was compounded by the discovery of oil in 1932 and the subsequent establishment of the Bahrain Petroleum Company (Bapco), as historic paperwork has revealed.

Bapco offered employment to many foreigners as well as Bahrainis, and as its workforce grew, it retained the services of the AMH for its staff.

Even as Bapco was establishing a full-fledged medical facility – Awali Hospital eventually opened in 1937 – AMH’s staff members were often seconded to the company.

During this time, several well-trained female doctors and nurses at the AMH formed friendships with Bapco employees, and as love blossomed marriage followed leading to a string of resignations, exacerbating the staffing shortage.

The first such instance was Dr Mary Tiffany, who arrived in Bahrain in 1930 and married Walter Haenggi, an oil driller, in 1932. Mr Haenggi was himself on secondment from Standard Oil Company of California, and when he returned to California in 1933, Dr Tiffany resigned from the AMH to accompany him.

In January 1935, nurse Alice Henrietta Oudemool came to Bahrain on a short-term assignment and became the nurse-in-charge. Within 11 months, she met and married Bapco’s general manager’s personal secretary Charles Rodstrom, and subsequently left the hospital.

Ms Oudemool swiftly fell pregnant and gave birth in Bahrain, and in 1939 the couple moved to Dhahran, where Bapco’s then sister company the California Arabian Standard Oil Company (CASOC) was established. Three of their four children were born in The Middle East during their stay, and one of their sons worked for Saudi Aramco at a later date.

Ms Oudemool’s replacement, Jennie Bast, arrived from Michigan in 1936 and soon met Alonzo Doney Bell, who had initially come to Bahrain as a radio operator on the ship El Segundo, but later joined Bapco in pipeline construction. Ms Bast and Mr Bell married in Bahrain on January 1, 1937, after which she resigned from the AMH and settled in the new Awali Township.

Although not an employee of AMH, Janet, the daughter of AMH’s chief medical officer, Dr Harold Storm, married a Bapco engineer, Bruce Pengelley. The couple then lived in Awali for many years before emigrating to Australia in the late 1970s.

In November 1992, they visited Bahrain to participate in the AMH’s centenary celebrations, and Dr Corine Overkamp, a long-time AMH physician, took them on a trip down memory lane in Awali. Janet Pengelley passed away in 2015.

The first Bapco general manager, Edward Skinner, arrived in Bahrain in 1932. He quickly became an integral part of the company and the local community, residing in a villa that would later become known for its association with the oil industry’s early days in Bahrain. His villa, a symbol of this era, stood until 1956, when it was demolished.

These instances highlight the unexpected impact of Bapco’s establishment on the staffing situation of the then already 30-year old AMH. While Bapco provided employment opportunities and contributed to Bahrain’s development, it also indirectly exacerbated the hospital’s challenges in retaining medical personnel.

The stories of these women also offer a glimpse into the social changes and cross-cultural interactions that occurred in Bahrain during this period.