1st Lt. Phyllis Mills Creamer Honored as Senate Veteran of the Year

Sen. Valesky selected 1st Lt. Phyllis Mills Creamer as the 53rd Senate District's Veteran of the Year. 1st Lt. Mills was honored during a ceremony in Albany on May 24. She was born in Kane, Pennsylvania on August 29, 1921 and was one of seven children raised in Penn Yan, NY. A 1942 graduate of the Syracuse General School of Nursing she joined the Army Nurse Corps in December 1943 at Fort Dix, NJ. After completing basic training in Atlantic City, 2nd Lt. Mills sailed from New York City on the Queen Elizabeth to establish the 160th General Medical Corps near Cheltenham, England in the Cotswolds - the largest U.S. Army hospital in the ETO  (Europeon Theater of Operations). She was promoted to 1st Lt. in 1944.

In late 1945, 1st Lt. Mills sailed back to New York City on the Queen Mary and was honorably discharged in early 1946.  She then studied public health under her GI Bill at Syracuse University and worked at the Visiting Nurses Association in Syracuse until she married. She retired in 1986 following 16 years at SU’s Student Health Service as a triage and allergy nurse. She was adjutant and then commander of the Valley VFW in Syracuse. She is a charter member of the Women in Military Service for America Memorial in Washington, DC and attended its dedication in October 1997. She is now 94 years old.