Virginia Hodgdon “Ginny” Roberts of Boothbay died November 18, 2013 at home from complications of a fractured hip. She was 87.

The daughter of Madeleine (Hains) and Philip Westbrook Hodgdon, she was born January 16, 1926 at St. Andrews Hospital in Boothbay Harbor, where she later spent much of her life as a nurse. She grew up on rural Hodgdon’s Island surrounded by a large extended family. Her father and uncle ran the Trevett store and post office, and she helped deliver groceries after school.

Her lifelong love of walking started early as she and her siblings and cousins walked everywhere, to grammar school on Barters Island and then to and from Boothbay Harbor High School, often walking back again at night for basketball games. Until just a few years ago, she was walking the five-mile loop into town and home every day.

After graduating from Boothbay Harbor High in 1943, Ginny worked as a nurse’s aide at St. Andrews and then earned her R.N. at Maine General Hospital in Portland, doing rotations in Boston and Washington, D.C.

She was married to John A. Roberts in 1947, and together they raised six children in the same 200-year-old waterfront house on Hodgdon’s Island where she grew up, tending flowers, which included historic peonies from her grandmother’s garden.

After her children were in school, Ginny went to work at St. Andrews, then an 18-bed hospital in the original wooden house, working with Dr. Philip Gregory, son of St. Andrews founder Dr. George Gregory. As charge nurse, she did everything from obstetrics to operating room, making decisions or delivering babies when a doctor could not get there in time. She was known for having high standards for nurses and compassion for patients. Dr. John Andrews would later call Ginny not just the charge nurse but the chief prankster who kept staff members on their toes.

Ginny was an early member of the local ambulance service started by Sonny Simmons, and when not working at the hospital would answer emergency calls or transport patients to facilities as far away as Key West and San Francisco, sometimes driving a Cadillac hearse which doubled as an ambulance or flying with Dr. Andrews in his airplane. Her busy career and family life became even more so when her husband John, son Gene and brother-in-law Alfred Roberts Sr. started the Ponderosa Campground in Boothbay in 1965. Always one to pitch in, she would leave her day job to spend evenings cleaning bathhouses and doing manual labor at the campground.

After 51 years as a nurse, 46 years at St. Andrews and five years private duty, Ginny retired in 1998. She was honored with a large gathering of colleagues, friends and family who paid tribute to her commitment to patients, her can-do spirit and her sense of humor. She leaves a legacy through daughters and granddaughters who have followed in her footsteps to devote their lives to nursing.

After retirement, Ginny enjoyed traveling with friends and family both in the U.S. and abroad. She continued to walk for exercise and enjoyment and continued to tend her gardens, read, knit, and cook for family. She was a life member of the Eastern Stars.

She will be remembered for her devotion to her large extended family, her love of her hometown, her discipline and hard work, her interest in and care for people, her sense of fun and contagious laugh.

She was predeceased by her daughter Virginia Ruth Roberts in 1970, her husband John in 1982, brothers Philip H. Hodgdon and Charles Stephen Hodgdon II, and her great-grandson Max Borgie.

Ginny is survived by her children, Rebecca Traquair and husband Russell of Boothbay; Sarah Laurie and husband Lucian of King George, Va.; Nancy Roberts of Boothbay Harbor; Eugene Roberts of Boothbay and South Carolina; John A. Roberts and wife Sheri of Blaine, Wash.; a sister, Deborah of Westbrook; 17 grandchildren, 10 great-grandchildren, and one great-great-grandson.

A memorial service will be held Saturday, Dec. 28 at 1 p.m. at the American Legion Hall, Industrial Park Road in Boothbay, with Ginny’s nephew Pastor Alfred Roberts of Boothbay Harbor officiating.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Opera House at Boothbay Harbor.