It is with great sadness that we announce that our mother, Nancy El-Hehiawy, passed peacefully on August 26, 2026 following a brief illness. She was just a few days shy of her 97th birthday and led a long, full life.
Nancy Alice Pike was born September 2,1929 in Willimantic, Connecticut to Joseph and Eleanor Pike, both Maine natives. Soon joined by brothers Fred and Tom, the family moved extensively during her childhood, with stops in Virginia, New Jersey, New Hampshire, and finally home to Maine. A child of the Great Depression and World War II, our mother’s formative years instilled in her the values by which she lived her life: kindness, practicality, generosity, hard work, and a thoughtful appreciation for life’s simple pleasures.
She attended nursing school at the University of Maine and received a Masters of Nursing at Boston University, graduating with honors each time. She began her nursing career in Lewiston, Maine before relocating to Boston, then briefly to San Francisco, via the 1962 World’s Fair in Seattle. She dedicated her life to others through nursing and eventually returned to Maine to help care for her ailing mother.
In 1965, she accepted a position teaching nursing at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. There she met our father, Mohamed El-Hehiawy, an Egyptian diplomat, on a blind date. They were married in July, 1966 and were inseparable for 46 years, until his passing in 2012. The newlyweds settled in Arlington, Virginia where they lived for 26 years and raised two sons, David and Joe. Always dedicated to family, our mother brought our grandfather, Joe Pike, to live with us for several winters in Arlington and helped care for him as he dealt with health issues. She was the driving force behind our 1984 family trip to Cairo, Egypt to meet our grandmother Nafisa, the first of our parent’s many visits to Egypt over the next 25 years. Our mother’s dedication and compassion were our guiding light and helped form us into the men we are today.
We fondly recall summer vacations outside Augusta, Maine or on North Carolina’s Outer Banks and many long weekends on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. As a family, we traveled the New England Coast from Cape Cod to Bar Harbor. Our mother visited England, Ireland, and other European destinations, as well as Hawaii, always with family. The gift of a love of travel was passed down to us by our mother.
In retirement, she returned to Maine where she and our father enjoyed summers surrounded by the beauty of the place she called home. No less important to her were the more than a dozen winters they spent with family she adored in Egypt, each trip a unique adventure that she chronicled in journals and with countless photographs. She spent her final 18 years in the Seattle area, with David close by and Joe and his family visiting regularly.
On September 19, 2026, we will again return our mother home to Maine, with a memorial service to be held at noon at Oakdale Cemetery in the town of Otisfield and a reception to follow on Thomas Pond. Family, friends, and all who knew Nancy are invited to attend and share their memories of our mother and the ways in which she touched their lives. In lieu of flowers or other remembrances, our family asks that our mother be honored with a donation to St Jude’s Children’s Hospital, a favorite among the many charitable causes to which she contributed throughout her life.
Nancy is survived by her sons David Hehyawi and Joseph El-Hehiawy and her granddaughters Lily El-Hehiawy and Erica El-Hehiawy, as well as nieces, nephews, and cousins from coast-to-coast. She was a friend to everyone she met, with a gentle soul that belied her strong will. She cherished those she was close to and she’ll be missed by all who knew her.
Please take a little time to do something you enjoy with someone close to you, in honor of Mom and because life’s too short not to, even at 97.
May you rest in peace Nancy. Always remember you in our hearts.