Pat Bradbury

Pat grew up in Pennsylvanian Dutch country.   After graduating from Lycoming College in 1968 she moved to Princeton, New Jersey, to work as a social welfare caseworker. While there a mutual friend introduced Pat to Ray Bradbury (deceased 1991), a college music professor and church organist/choir director.  They married in 1969.  After living in nine states where Pat likewise tried nine different jobs, she moved to Lynchburg in 2012 to be near one of her daughters.  She says that she learned from, and loved, all her jobs and can name other careers/jobs she would enjoy trying, but doubts that will happen.

With three children, their spouses and seven grandchildren in three states, travel has become a regular part of Pat’s life. Each summer since 2012, she has taken at least one of her grandchildren on a trip.   Whether for adventure, education or learning about their roots, the trips create memories that she records in a scrapbook for each grandchild.

With music as a lifelong avocation, Pat has been singing since a child in church choirs and community choral groups. She has performed in community theater and even tried tap dancing in Nunsense. She has also assisted with children’s choirs. Pat, like all musicians, needs music in her life which she satisfies by attending musical events in central Virginia.

In addition to her musical activities, Pat, following her parents’ example, has been an active church and community volunteer, leading outreach opportunities at the churches of which she was a member. At St. John’s Episcopal Church, she initiated a backpack program to provide weekend food for children and led a Potato Drop to distribute sweet potatoes for Society of St. Andrew. After volunteering as a tutor at Linkhorne Elementary School, she organized other volunteer tutors. At Parkview Mission she organized drivers to help neighbors transport their food to their homes.  Currently she ushers and works as a receptionist at the Academy Center of The Arts.

Among all of Pat’s interests, her strongest passion has been Family Promise, a national nonprofit organization assisting children and their families facing homelessness.  As a volunteer for 15+ years, Pat has traveled the United States helping over fifty communities organize their efforts toward eradicating homelessness for children and their families. 

Pat sees her move to Westminster Canterbury Lynchburg as another opportunity to carry on a family tradition of volunteering. Her parents, sisters, other family members, and close friends are living or have lived at continuous care retirement communities.  There is no doubt in her mind that retirement community living is the best place to spend her coming years!