Edith Ahlgren Bollinger, 91

Edith Delores Ahlgren Bollinger, April 11, 1920 - March 10, 2012.

Edith Delores Ahlgren Bollinger of Atlanta, Ga., died on Saturday, March 10, after a brief illness. The former Hudson, Wis., native was 91 when she passed peacefully from this world.

She was the eldest daughter and only living child of the late Carl and Marion Ahlgren of Hudson. She was preceded in death by her brother, Carl "Bub" Ahlgren, and sister, Ethel "Sis" Ahlgren Hanley. In 1938, she graduated with honors from Hudson High School where she was a cheerleader, lettered in basketball, and was a member of the debate team and student council. Edith was always very active: hiking, canoeing, ice skating and swimming the St. Croix River. She graduated salutatorian from Bethesda Hospital Nursing School in St. Paul, Minn., as an RN, and enlisted in the Army Air Corps shortly after Pearl Harbor. She served her country in the South Pacific as a flight nurse in the 801st, was in the first group of nurses on Guadalcanal, and helped to set up one of the first air-evac hospitals in New Caledonia and in the New Hebrides. While in the South Pacific, she met and married her husband, Ralph Perry Bollinger of Norman, Okla., who was a pilot flying with the 13th Air Depot.

After the war, Ralph flew for Trans World Airlines (TWA) and later became a petroleum landman. Edith was an extraordinary homemaker and mother to their much-loved family of five children, making a wonderful and beautiful home filled with love each of the 28 times the family moved (even to Cairo, Egypt.) She led by example in the communities she joined: she was a Cub Scout den mother for two sons, Sunday school teacher, first aid instructor, and worked as an RN in Shreveport, La.; New Orleans; Conroe, Texas; and Houston. In 1965, she returned to school part-time and earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in English from St. Mary's Dominican College, Houston. She later earned her Master's Degree in Nursing from Texas Women's University. Along the way, she wrote poetry, painted watercolors, and devotedly kept the extended family in touch through correspondence, calls, and visits.

She was a member of Leggett Memorial Methodist Church in Biloxi, Miss., and attended Peachtree Road United Methodist Church in Atlanta, Ga.

Survivors include two sons, Ralph Randal Bollinger, MD, and his wife, Monika, of Durham, N.C.; William Guest Bollinger and his wife, Judy, of Singapore; two daughters: Barbara Ann Bollinger of Atlanta, Ga., and Elizabeth Jean Bollinger of Durham, N.C. One son, John Cary Bollinger, predeceased her. She cherished her role as grandmother to seven grandchildren: Christie Bollinger Pappas and her husband, Keith; Mark Bollinger; Erik Krippner and his wife, Faye; Jesse Bollinger and his wife, Aree; Kevyn Weiner; Douglas and James Bollinger. She was beloved "G.G." to four great-grandchildren, Joseph Pappas, Luke Pappas, Daniel Pappas, Alex Bollinger; and additionally, loving "Aunt Edith" and "Edith" to numerous nieces, nephews, and cousins.

She will be especially remembered for instilling in her children a vision and a passion for "a big world" filled with curiosity, travel, education, new beginnings, and new horizons. She embraced a deep-seated belief in family, country, and "God's beautiful world." We will forever remember her singing: "This is my Father's world, and to my listening ears, all nature sings and round me rings the music of the spheres."

Internment was in Norman, Okla.

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