Elena Benioff was born 16 October, 1932, in Pasadena, California, to Alice Silverman Benioff and Hugo Benioff. She was the youngest of three siblings, with one older brother and one younger sister.
Elena met her first husband, Ernest Gilson (Gil) Jackson, on the family ranch in Nevada where he had been hired to help with the cattle. They married in Berkeley, California, on 15 June, 1951 when Elena was 18. They settled in Colorado and had two sons and one daughter.
She married Richard Alan Slusser on 11 June, 1965 in Allenspark, Colorado. He brought two children to the marriage. Elena and Richard were divorced 10 November, 1977.
Elena became a CPA. She met and settled down with Jean Cannella in Longmont, Colorado, where she died in October of 2024.
