When Ellen Theresa Schroth was born on 7 June 1929, in Cincinnati, Hamilton, Ohio, United States, her father, Edward Schroth, was 39 and her mother, Mary Elizabeth Doherty, was 41. She married John Thomas Burke on 19 May 1951, in Hamilton, Ohio, United States. She died on 22 June 2009, in Cincinnati, Hamilton, Ohio, United States, at the age of 80, and was buried in Cincinnati, Hamilton, Ohio, United States.