Dorothy "Darlene" Marlene Haag

Dorothy Marlene Haag, a holistic Registered Nurse who also spent more than 60 years singing barbershop harmony as a Sweet Adeline, died on the winter solstice, Dec. 21, 2024. She was 93.

Darlene, as she was known to family and friends, considered herself a lifelong learner, completing a bachelor’s degree in California a dozen years after she finished her registered nurse’s training in Illinois. She held credentials as a school nurse, a holistic nurse and in the modalities of healing touch and zero balancing. She maintained a private practice in holistic nursing until her a few years before her death.

She was born Dorothy Marlene (Darlene) Keeley July 6, 1931, at Chicago Lying-in Hospital, to Gertrude and James Keeley. Her father combined her first two names to create her nickname Darlene, by which she was typically known. Her sister Judith (Judy) was born in 1935. Her father was a pianist and piano teacher at DePaul University in Chicago before doing a variety of jobs during the Depression. Her mother (who in the 1960s owned an antiques store in Santa Monica, California) was a Christian Scientist who used the healing skills of both Christian Science healers and medical doctors. Both Darlene and Judy became nurses.

 “A friend said she was going to nursing school, and I thought, ‘That sounds good,’” Darlene recalled. “I’d never thought about career choices, but I knew I had to find something. Nurses could work anywhere. As a Depression baby, having a job was important.”

In the fall of 1949, Darlene started nursing school at Wesley Methodist Hospital in Chicago, which was affiliated with Northwestern University. She completed her training in 1952.

“We were watching the Rose Bowl on our little black and white TV in Chicago,” she remembered, “and saw people there in shorts in January while we had snow up to our armpits. I thought, ‘I need to do something. Why don’t I go to California?’”

She applied to hospitals in L.A. and San Francisco. She accepted a position as a psychiatric nurse at the Long Beach Veterans Administration hospital in Southern California partly because the Haag family, longtime friends, had moved there. With her sister, Darlene drove to California in 1953, and in 1956 she started dating Roger Haag. They married in 1957 and bought their first house in Long Beach. They had two daughters—Janis, born in 1958, and Donna, born in 1960. After moving to the town of Orange, California, Darlene took classes at Santa Ana Junior College, Fullerton and Long Beach State to complete her bachelor of science degree in nursing (BSN) from Northwestern in 1965

Darlene, who loved barbershop harmony, joined the Harborlites chorus in Costa Mesa as a Sweet Adeline in 1964, singing baritone. As a Sweet Adeline in Southern and Northern California choruses and quartets she sang in many competitions, as well as at Carnegie Hall and Pearl Harbor, for more than 60 years.

The Haags moved to Northern California in 1966 and bought a house next to Folsom Lake. Avid water skiers, they put the boat Roger had built from a kit into the lake and taught their daughters to ski. Darlene lived in their home in Granite Bay for the rest of her life. Roger Haag died in 2004.

She became a credentialed school nurse, working mostly for the Placer High School District from 1968-2001. In the 1970s she began studying holistic nursing. In the 1990s she became a certified holistic nurse, as well as completing certificates in healing touch, therapeutic touch and zero balancing. She was a founding member of the American Holistic Nurses Association and maintained a private practice as a holistic nurse until several years before her death. 

Darlene is survived by her daughters, Janis Haag and Donna Just, her son-in-law Eric Just, as well as granddaughter Lauren Just Giel, her husband Gerald Giel, and their son Henry, and by her grandson Kevin Just and his wife Ashley Just. At her request, no memorial service is planned.

In lieu of flowers, donations can be made in her memory to the American Holistic Nurses Association here: https://www.ahna.org/American-Holistic-Nurses-Association/Donate