Brenda M. Brubaker was born in 1950 in the rural farming community of Madelia, Minnesota. She attended high school at Wilson Campus School, an innovative campus laboratory high school, at Mankato State University (renamed Minnesota State University, Mankato). During high school, Brubaker assisted in a nursing home during the evenings, taking care of patients by giving baths, distributing medications, and getting them to bed. She was also a member of the high school marching and concert bands, playing tenor and baritone saxophone. In 1969, Brubaker began attending St. Olaf College, which was physically located in Northfield, Minnesota, but the nursing program was based entirely in nearby Minneapolis. During this time in America, anti-war protests and peace rallies were held across the nation. As a nursing student, Brubaker and others would operate first aid booths, often having to treat demonstrators who had been sprayed with pepper-spray. Once Brubaker had completed her freshman and sophomore years of college, she could not continue to pay for her studies. A school counselor suggested she join the military, to which Brubaker replied she couldn't because she couldn't support the war. The counselor offered other options which didn't directly support the Vietnam War, one of which was a United States Navy program that would pay for Brubaker's last two years of college, and she would owe them time in service in return. In 1971, Brubaker joined the United States Navy Nurse Corps. When Brubaker had four months of nurses' training left, she was commissioned as an ensign and received a pay increase. She finished nursing school in December 1972 and received orders the next day to the Direct Commission Officer Indoctrination Course (DCIOC), which she began 1 February 1973 at Naval Officer Training Command Newport, Rhode Island. During this training, Brubaker became frustrated because she wasn't being given much information about being in the Navy Nurse Corps, and instead was doing more military-related things, such as standing guard duty and performing clean-up duty; something she didn't feel the need to do because she would be going to work in a hospital, not a war. Brubaker's first duty station hospital assignment was at Philadelphia Naval Hospital, Pennsylvania, where she was placed immediately in the dependent's ward, treating active-duty military member's dependents. She also treated enlisted female patients, as there was not a ward specifically for enlisted women. After a while, Brubaker decided she did not enjoy working in the dependent's ward and requested to be transferred to a psychiatric unit. Her request was granted, and she received a temporary duty assignment (TDY) to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Washington, D.C. to complete their psychiatric nursing program. Upon completion of the psychiatric nursing program at Walter Reed, Brubaker returned to Philadelphia Naval Hospital, where she had the opportunity to treat patients suffering with acute-traumatic stress disorder from having seen their comrades killed in action. She also witnessed the progression and improvements in the treatment of psychiatric disorders, using new anti-depressants and more humane, less barbaric, treatment methods instead of electroshock therapy. Brubaker also used her time at Walter Reed to entertain the patients, some of whom were there for months, by taking them on field trips to the Philadelphia Zoo, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and various sports games. During mid-1976, with the Vietnam War over, psychiatric medical wards ceased operations as there were less soldiers to treat. Brubaker considered continuing with the U.S. Navy Nurse Corps, but once she began to see military protocol take precedence over a human being's life, she decided to finish her contracted time and detach from the military. In 1976, Brubaker resigned her commission with the U.S. Navy Nurse Corps; freeing her to accompany her husband to his assigned duty stations. Brubaker never resigned her commission and was still considered inactive ready reserve. After the U.S. Navy Nurse Corps, Brubaker attempted to obtain employment with a civilian hospital, but found numerous times that she was frowned upon as a job candidate because she had been a part of the Vietnam War, although she had never done nursing overseas. She then applied for a position at a Catholic hospital run by nuns, who ultimately decided to hire her. Eventually, the Brubakers moved to North Carolina, and she worked at a Veterans Hospital until a new chief nurse was hired and started to implement drastic policy changes.
