ELVA "VIRGINIA" BRINKERHOFF SWEETLAND ~ Class of 1954
March 25, 1936 - February 13, 2010

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Virginia died February 13, 2010, after a long bout with cancer, in Republic, WA, where she spent her last years with her loving animals, two dogs and a cat. Her husband, Russell Fredrick Sweetland, passed away a few years earlier.

She was born March 25, 1936, in St, Anthony, ID the 2nd of six children born to to Jesse R. and Elva Staker Brinkerhoff. She moved with her family to the Hanford nuclear reservation in 1943 where the family lived for a short time in an abandoned farm house near the reservation town of White Bluffs, WA before moving into one of the first homes available in the newly created "Atomic City" of Richland. She attended Richland public schools and graduated from Columbia High School in 1954.

She was preceeded in death by a brother, Jesse "Reed" ('52).

She is survived by a daughter, Lauri Jae Sweetland, and a son, Joel Lynn Sweetland and by two grandchildren. Also surviving are her sister Doris Brinkerhoff DeFord ('57) and her brothers Kenneth ('61), Richard ('74), and Keith ('76) Brinkerhoff.