Growing up in Northern New Jersey, Ellie Bilinski always wanted to be a nurse. While attending Boston College, she majored in nursing and was offered a Navy scholarship which helped defray college costs. She became part of the Naval Reserve. When she graduated in 1967, she fulfilled her promise to be a Navy nurse for the next three years. As a Lieutenant J.G., Ellie worked at Chelsea Naval Hospital in Massachusetts focusing on the orthopedic and intensive care units . Soldiers and sailors who were injured in the Vietnam War were her patients.
Ellie speaks highly of the Navy corpsmen who were trained to treat the wounded on the battlefield. They taught her so much- how to do meds and how to work with wounded patients. Eventually she then trained other corpsmen. The corpsmen often continued their training to become doctors and nurses. When Ellie had night duty, she was the only nurse and depended on the corpsmen for assistance.
While she was at Chelsea Naval Hospital , Ellie’s husband Ed was in Vietnam. After leaving the Navy in 1970, Ellie continued her nursing career while she was raising her children. For many years, she worked as an I.C.U. nurse and credits her Navy training for her love of this field.
Ellie also worked as a school nurse at a public high school. In retirement she was a substitute nurse for special needs children and volunteered as President of the Board of Health in Glen Ridge, New Jersey.
Ellie and Ed moved to Londonderry in 2023.
