Eleanor was rotated from England back to New York in 1944, and received an honorable discharge shortly thereafter.She had entered the Army Nursing Corp on June 15, 1943 and was discharged on September 10th 1944 at Mitchell Field, New York. She final discharge papers rated her character and service as "EXCELLENT".
She was now faced with the question of what she would do with her life. She decided that she really didn't want to return to Minnesota, as she wasn't the same person I was when she left. A fellow nurse, Lt Carpenter and Eleanor decided to go to California, and since Carpenter had relatives in Pomona, they decided to take a train out west.
Once in Pomona, they stayed with Carpenter's relatives and both nurses found jobs at the blood bank. Eleanor said that she drew the blood of Ingrid Bergman and Mrs. Ronald Coleman, so lots of people were still active in blood drives at this point. Eventually Carpenter and Eleanor found an apartment in Los Angeles, which was quite a feat as there were shortages of housing in most of the cities with defense industries.
One day in May 1945, she was riding the bus home from work and sat next to a army airman. He was in uniform and Eleanor said he had the biggest brown eyes she had ever seen. As she was getting off the bus, she smiled and said "why don't you come up and see me sometime". She had no idea why she said it, but a couple days later, this army air corps Sargent showed up at the door. "Fred" was in California waiting for orders to be sent to the Pacific Theater. He had seen a lot of combat as a bombadeer, and gunner on B 24,s in Libya and Italy. They dated for the next three months, and got married on July 28th, 1945.
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