Evelyn Blaine Durkin
About the Author
Daughter to Mary Meehan Blaine and Patrick George Blaine, Evelyn was born in Washington Heights NYC in 1931. In May 1932 she returned to her parents' hometown in County Donegal via ship with her mother and elder sister Myra as Mary carried unborn Patrick George. Finding little solace from The Great Depression, they embarked again for New York a year later.
DeDe, as Evelyn came to be called, grew up in The Heights with her parents, sister and brother in a household deemed to be the first stop in NYC for Donegal emigres then seeking a foothold in America. Blaine-Meehan ceilis continued through their childhood, anchored by a pair of stand-up pianos parked back-to-back in Pop & Mary's center room and a beer keg in the bathtub.
DeDe attended Hunter College, married the young Korean War veteran Francis "Buddy" Durkin in 1953, and in 1960 left Washington Heights for Ossining, NY, raising Laura, Clare, Mark and Jenifer.
In her forties, DeDe began her career in reinsurance. On 9/11, still consulting at the age of 70, DeDe was working on Fulton Street in NYC, across Broadway from the twin towers. She employed her ample NY moxie to escape north via taxi. She returned to work a month later, haunted by "the pall" hanging over the area.
After Bud passed in 1998, DeDe lived on Manhattan's Upper West Side, not far from her childhood home, until her passing in 2011.