Ellingsen Jane Bemish

1928 - 2024

JANE BEMISH ELLINGSEN

December 31, 1928 to April 6, 2024

Former Grass Valley resident Jane Anne Bemish Ellingsen died peacefully on April 6, 2014, after five years of declining health.  She was 95 years old.  She was a beloved daughter, wife, and mother.  Jane was born on December 31, 1928, to Ward and Esther (Blakley) Bemish in

Rochester, New York, growing up on Grand Avenue with her parents, her sister Marilyn, her adored and adoring grandmother Esther (McKinnon) Blakley, and an ongoing stream of dogs (always black) beginning with Old Pete and ending with Tar.  Jane was very active in school

government and school band.  She had fond memories of ice skating on the ice ponds the city of Rochester created each winter in neighborhood parks.

When she was eighteen, she moved with her family to California.  She trained as a registered nurse at Highland Hospital in Oakland, CA.  There, she met her future husband, Wilbur Eugene Ellingsen, while attending a dance at the Ali Baba Ballroom.  They were married on June 17, 1950, and moved to Pleasant Hill, California, where she began her career in nursing and her husband's career in real estate.  They eventually bought five acres of land where they raised three children, two horses, two sheep, one dog, one cat, one rabbit, and an ever-multiplying population of chickens.

In 1971, she moved with her husband to Brookings, Oregon, where they lived for many years, fishing, golfing, and playing bridge. But Jane continued with her education, earning a baccalaureate in nursing from the University of Oregon and a Master's in nursing from the University of Colorado. She then returned to Brookings, where she worked as a Curry County Public Health nurse practitioner.

In 2002, after caring for her husband through a long, debilitating illness, she moved to California to be closer to her children.  She enjoyed a well-earned life of leisure, continuing with her hobbies of golf, bridge, and reading mysteries.  She is survived by her sons and their spouses, Robert Ellingsen and Larry Arnesen of Watsonville, California, and Marc and Ellen Ellingsen of

Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, two grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.  Her husband, Wilbur Eugene Ellingsen, and daughter, Linda Ellingsen Grevstad, preceded her death.

There will be a Private Family Memorial

at a later date.