Mary Fickett, the actress who played the legendary soap opera character, Nurse Ruth Martin for 30 years on crowd-pleasing daytime drama All My Children, has passed away.
Here is a recap of the dramatic life of Nurse Ruth courtesy of Daytime Confidential:
Debuting on AMC in 1970, Fickett portrayed Ruth for nearly 30 years. She saw her legendary character protest the Vietnam War, deal with the secret that her “son” Phil (Richard Hatch) was really her nephew, fall in love and marry Dr. Joe Martin (Ray MacDonnell), endure the vicious rape of Ray Gardner (Gil Rogers) and adopt Ray and Opal’s (Dorothy Lyman, Jill Larson) abandoned son Tad (most notably Michael E. Knight), all before giving birth to her and Joe’s biological son Joey aka Jake (now played by Ricky Paull Goldin).
If you ever watched All My Children (go ahead…confess if you did!), do you remember Ruth? Here are a couple vintage clips to jog your memory.
Clip #1: “I…am a NURSE. And I am…PROUD…of it.”
Clip #2: Ruth’s eulogy for friend/patient Mona.
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