Mabel Almira Braaten was born March 15, 1907 in Melfort, Saskatchewan to Alfred Braaten and Eda Braaten (nee Haugerud). Mabel took her first years of schooling at Clapton School, then attended high school in Melfort. She entered Normal School at age 17, and earned a first class certificate. Mabel's first position was at a log schoolhouse at Pontrilas. Her teaching career continued for 14 years, taking her to country schools at Pathlow, Hogstrom and Ethelton. For a brief period, Mabel worked in Toronto at the "Inspection and Test" office at Research Enterprises, Ltd. where her brother, Everett, worked as a prominent physicist. However, after two years, Mabel returned to Melfort to teach at Melfort Broadway School, where she would teach grade two for 29 years. Mabel remained active in the Melfort United Church throughout her life and, during her youth, was a member of the young people's group, "The Alerts."

During the 1950s and 1960s, nurses of Saskatchewan came to believe that collective bargaining was necessary to improve working conditions, and to keep pace with salaries and benefits of organised hospital service workers and other professions. From 1966 to 1973, the Saskatchewan Registered Nurses' Association – the nurses' professional licensing body – negotiated contracts on behalf of local Staff Nurses' Associations formed within hospitals. Following a legal challenge in 1973, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that SRNA could not be certified as a trade union. Rather than disband, the nurses formed the Saskatchewan Union of Nurses (SUN) on 19 January 1974. SUN Local 106 was established to represent all registered nurses, graduate nurses and other allied personnel employed by the Regina General Hospital. in 1974 approximately 2400 Saskatchewan nurses from 78 hospitals went on strike – the first province-wide strike by nurses in Canada. SUN is affiliated with the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour (1996) and the Canadian Labour Congress (1997). It is a founding member of the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions (1981).