Mary Patterson

Raised in Runnemede, New Jersey, Mary Teresa Patterson was the third child of Stanly F. Crooks Jr. and Margaret Jane (Cashin) Crooks. She attended Catholic school as a child and fondly remembered her parents’ annual vacations in Ocean City, NJ—a tradition that she and her sister continued with their own children each year.

Mary lost her parents as a teenager and went to live with her newly-married sister Stella and her husband Mark. Upon graduating from high school, Mary earned a B.A. in Education from Evangel University in Springfield, MO and later an M.A. in Cross-Cultural Education from California State University, San Marcos. During her time at Evangel, she was a resident assistant, secretary of student government, a Homecoming princess, and friend to everyone. As her college room-mate says, “Mary made everyone’s life better.”

She met her husband Eric while attending Evangel, sending him an anonymous note to attend a Sadie Hawkins-style event on the same day that he asked her out on a date to watch the play, “To Kill a Mockingbird.” They maintained a long-distance relationship while he finished college and she polished her Spanish while teaching at a private school in Caracas, Venezuela. The day after their marriage in 1994 they moved to Aberystwyth, Wales for a year where Eric worked on his M.A. while Mary worked a variety of jobs, including at a fish-and-chips shop and the city probation office.

Upon returning to the U.S. in 1995, Mary returned to teaching. Over the years she taught public elementary school, a university course on Children's Literature, English as a Second Language, and later co-directed the First Baptist Church of Alexandria Preschool Ministry. But she most relished raising her children in the context of church and community, serving and leading in Missionettes (a Christian girls program), MOPS (Mothers of Preschool Students), Sunday School, Vacation Bible School, and the PTA. Mary said, “I want my house to be a safe one for all the kids in the neighborhood to hang out at.”

Mary’s friends and family knew her as a gift giver, from a note in one’s lunchbox to a book “that you have to read!” She loved connecting people and providing opportunities for others to get involved. Most of all, Mary loved her Lord Jesus Christ and her family, especially her two children Spencer William (2001) and Jane Margaret (2004). She was interested in and proud of everything about her children, from dimples to their personalities to their accomplishments. Mary Teresa Patterson is survived by her immediate family, her sister Stella Scafidi, the extended Patterson and Scafidi families, and thousands of friends.

Services were conducted at First Baptist Church of Alexandria, VA, Rosewood Memorial Park (Virginia Beach, VA), and First Assembly of God Church in Pennington, NJ where Eric proposed and later they were married. The tribute on her grave marker reminds all that she loved deeply, and was loved in return: “Devoted Mother, Best of Friends.”