Elaine Virginia McBride

Our beloved Elaine Virginia Ambagis McBride traversed ""The Rainbow Bridge"" during the late afternoon of Friday August 2, 2013 at St Anthony's Hospital in Lakewood when she calmly, peacefully and with supreme dignity ended her valiant battle against leukemia. Her quietus and passing of the other side of life's journey via that mystical span, whereby she will be forever in the company of departed friends, family, and pets, was attended by her immediate family: Husband Bob; sons Christopher, Frank, Paul; and daughter-in-law. Born January 2, 1931 as the youngest of the three first generation daughters to Greek and Italian immigrant parents in New Haven, Connecticut, Elaine lived a long and fulfilling life during which she graduated from Quinnipiac College and worked at Yale University prior to moving to New York City to become a United Airlines ""stewardess"" on transcontinental DC-7's. During those elegant, glamour-infused flying days of the late 1950s, she attended the likes of Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., Peggy Lee, and the outrageous Tallulah Bankhead, encounters which provided her family and friends with numerous amusing stories over the years. While living in New York she met and married Bob at St. Patrick's Cathedral in 1957. The couple then relocated to Chicago where her three sons were born and the family enjoyed many happy times in the idyllic setting of Tower Lakes. 1973 saw a move further to the west as the McBrides took up residence in Evergreen where they have now lived for forty years. Though she circumnavigated the globe throughout a lifetime of travels, in her latter years Elaine's most favored location was the flower-laden deck of her home in Evergreen overlooking Bear Mountain, accompanied by her cats Mandalay and Sulu. Possessed of a bit of a maverick streak, she penned her own epitaph as an economic description of a fruitful life as she saw it: ""I was born, I died, and in between I went to the prom"". All who knew her are blessed with lives that are better, richer, and more fulfilled for having been in her orbit. To say that she will be missed every minute of every is a vast understatement. A uniquely beautiful and selflessly giving mother and wife, there will never be another quite like her and to know her was to love her. A memorial and Celebration of Life service will be held on Saturday, September 14, 2013 at Christ the King Church in evergreen at 10:30am. Everyone Elaine touched knows that in lieu of flowers or other tribute she would vastly prefer that a donation be made to the Evergreen Animal Protection League at 27888 Meadow Drive, Evergreen, Colorado 80439. Aloha our dear sweet angel; forever aloha and eternally mahola. Please share memories of Elaine, and condolences with her family in the guest book below.