Joan L. Wilder, a retired operating room nurse, died of multiple organ failure Friday at the Jewish Convalescent and Nursing Home in Pikesville.

The former Towson resident was 85.

Born Joan Leberman in Baltimore, she was a Forest Park High School graduate. She met her future husband, Dr. Earle M. Wilder, while she was a student at Sinai Hospital's School of Nursing.

Dr. Wilder was her physiology and anatomy instructor. She had to receive permission from hospital authorities to be married in 1944 before she finished the program.

"They made an exception for her because she was such a good student and because it was wartime and they needed nurses," said a grandson, Dimitri Blondel of Gainesville, Fla.

Mrs. Wilder was a nurse at Sinai in the 1940s and then took time to raise a family. She returned to nursing in the 1960s and retired about 20 years ago. Her husband died in 1966.

She enjoyed painting in oils and traveled extensively.

Services are private.

Other survivors include a daughter, Linda Blondel of Charlottesville, Va.; a son, David Wilder; four grandchildren; and a great-grandson.

Daughter Deborah W. Sirkin died in 1996, and daughter Jude Wilder died 2001.