Editor’s note: In true Eileen fashion, and always being prepared, Eileen has presented us with a few revisions of the obituary she wrote for herself. This is her last revision, written a little over a year ago.

Eileen Marie Hill Brown

Eileen Hill Brown was 73 when she died in Oak Harbor, WA on Saturday, September 27, 2014. Anyone who picked up a newspaper on Whidbey Island over the last 30 years is familiar with her name as editor of the original base newspaper “Crosswind” for over 20 years, as “Life on Whidbey” weekly columnist in the Whidbey News Times’ Wednesday edition and “Still Talking” columnist in Whidbey Weekly.

Eileen was born in Chicago on February 16, 1941, to Marcus Stow Hill and Eileen Marie MacAvoy. It was decided by the court that Eileen and her older brother Marcus would be placed at St. Mary’s Training School in Des Plaines, IL. She was just 4 ½ years old. Eileen stayed behind as Marcus went to live with their father and stepmother, Marcus and Ruth Hill of Fairbanks, AK. At age 11, legal custody was returned to her mother after she married Charles Lavalle. Her mother died when Eileen was 13 and she was placed in the guardianship of her uncle Arthur Raymond Carter. With her graduation pending in June 1958, Eileen entered the next phase of her education, learning to support herself without a safety net.

As a budding career girl, Eileen worked in product promotion for F.S. Tiger Company sportswear and Formfit-Rogers intimate apparel. In the 1960s, women who worked for advertising agencies along Chicago’s Michigan Avenue were automatically classified as secretaries. Eileen took her skills to graphic art companies as a freelance writer. They quickly saw she was as capable as any man and her copy reached American homes on the back of cereal boxes, direct mail and print ads.

Eileen worked as assistant to the Marketing Director of Weyerhaeuser’s Paperboard Packaging Division but was caught in the revolving door and left without a job when that division’s waxed frozen TV dinner packaging didn’t hold up as well as their competitors. Returning to freelance copywriting, she wrote promotional copy for many Chicago businesses and wrote promotional brochures for special editions of Encyclopedia Britannica.

Eileen moved to Washington State in the late 1960s, finding a job writing radio commercials at KBRO Radio, Bremerton. At least now she was just a ferry ride away from her terminally ill father and stepmother in Seattle. After her father’s death in late 1969, Eileen and Ruth’s relationship blossomed and Ruthie would later move to Whidbey Island.

In 1971, Eileen married Navy man Gene L. Cushway of Seattle. Their son Marcus Gene was born in Oakland, CA in 1972. The family came to Whidbey Island in 1974, settling into their Penn Cove home.

Eileen worked as visual merchandising supervisor for the Navy Exchange at the Seaplane Base and was one of a large team of associates behind the conversion and opening in 1976 of the modern store in what had once been a World War II PBY Catalina seaplane hangar.

Some of the best advice she got came from a neighbor who urged her to take the test for a job at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island. Her career in Civil Service began in 1977 when she became a clerk typist in Public Works Maintenance. A year later, she moved to the Public Affairs Department as a clerk typist and tour guide, but the job she really wanted was one door down, in the Crosswind newspaper office.

Eileen joined the Crosswind in 1979 where she worked side-by-side with Editor Lee Brainard for six years. When Lee retired, Eileen applied for the job of editor and was promoted in 1985. Both women were extremely proud that Crosswind received honors as best Navy newspaper in both 1980 and 1981 and picked up the coveted Thomas Jefferson Award for Best Armed Services Newspaper in 1980.

Her good judgment appeared in Crosswind weekly commentaries where she gave people food for thought without telling them how to think. As editor, she was concerned when any OpSec was lifted, concerned that aviators’ names and movements would be revealed when awarding them for airmanship over hostile territory. She never ceased to worry about the safety of American troops.

Eileen joked that she would have to become a model employee when she was selected NAS Whidbey Island Civilian of the Year in 2001. Her scrapbooks of mementoes gathered from over 26 ½ years as a federal servant tell of that award, but perhaps her most treasured notes were from boys and girls with special needs she took to see the SAR helicopter.

Of course, she was not expecting a Meritorious Civilian Service Award when she retired in 2004, but she kept that document with other emblems of her service.

Hired by the Whidbey News Times as a columnist in August 2004, she wrote “Life on Whidbey” each Wednesday. Readers enjoyed her breezy take on stories about people on North Whidbey Island.

In October 2004, she began working for Sound Publishing as a copy editor for the Whidbey edition of the Northwest Navigator, the regional newspaper that replaced Crosswind.

Eileen’s father couldn’t serve in the military but was a patriot who often shed a tear when the Star Spangled Banner was played. She believed we could never adequately thank our veterans and that we ought to do everything we can to keep their history alive.

In that regard, she was one of the three people who founded the PBY Memorial Association in 1998, becoming a plank owner. Past President Win Stites and his wife Donna credited her publicity in Crosswind and newspapers around the region with daring to create a historic center to tell the PBY’s story and that of every aircraft flown from NAS Whidbey. She was their publicity chairman and board member until she stepped down in 2005, becoming their first Board Member Emeritus.

Eric Marshall, editor of Whidbey Weekly, knew Eileen was highly regarded in the community and persuaded her to once more tackle a new weekly column called “Still Talking.” He was right. Readers loved her.

Eileen is survived by her son Marcus Gene Cushway and wife Nadine of Oak Harbor as well as several cousins. Her brother, retired U.S. Navy Senior Chief Hull Technician (Master Diver) Mark Hill, died in December 2003.

Eileen supported Whidbey Animals’ Improvement Foundation (WAIF). Remembrances in her name may be sent to WAIF, PO Box 1108, Coupeville, WA 98239.

On a cold winter day several years ago, Eileen and her son Marcus drove to Sunnyside Cemetery where she had previously bought a small plot in which to be laid to rest. “By the time you come here, these young trees will be a forest,” he said. She thought that was perfect.

Eileen chose Wallin Funeral Home & Cremation of Oak Harbor to handle her final arrangements. Please share a comment or story on their website at www.wallinfuneralhome.com

Footnote: Services for Eileen with be held on Sunday, October 12, 2014 at Wallin Funeral Home beginning at 2:00 pm. A reception will follow.

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