Margaret T. Burdick Memorial Nursing Scholarship

This scholarship was established by Dr. Glenn R. Burdick in honor and loving memory of his mother, Margaret T. Burdick, LPN.

Born on September 29, 1919 on Virginia’s Eastern Shore, Mrs. Burdick was the youngest daughter of John Underhill and Nollie Ward Thompson. She graduated from Exmore-Willis Wharf High School in 1936 and began her nursing training at Danville Memorial Hospital that fall. When she left the program to recuperate from an illness the following spring and then returned to the school, her instructors insisted that she start her program over. Due to a lack of financial resources, she chose to terminate her studies and seek employment as a nurse’s aide at the hospital in Nassawadox, Va. Her supervisors were so impressed by her knowledge of nursing that they arranged for her to take the licensing examination. She passed the exam, and in 1939, she went to work for a local practitioner in Exmore, Va.

In 1948, she married Eben V. Burdick Jr., a young U.S. Navy veteran of World War II. The couple moved to Portsmouth, where Eben worked in the naval shipyard and Margaret stayed home with their two sons, Glenn and Brent. By 1972, both of her sons were grown and Margaret decided to return to work. She renewed her license and began as a licensed practical nurse (LPN) at Portsmouth Convalescent Center, a local nursing home. Several years later, when that facility was converted to other medical uses, she was hired by Autumn Care, a nursing facility three blocks from her home. She tried to retire from there in her seventies, but her supervisors were unwilling to see her go. They created a part-time job for her with her responsibilities being to write patient summaries. She remained active in this job until age 80, when her health declined.

Margaret Thompson Burdick was a loving wife and mother who loved her God and family deeply and demonstrated great compassion and respect for her patients during a career of 37 years. She loved to sing and play the organ and was often referred to by her patients as “the singing nurse.” On February 21, 2004, she died in the nursing home where she had worked for over 20 years.