Patricia M. Balsamo

The only child of Dwight L. Mink, an automotive executive, and Margaret Strom Mink, a psychiatric social worker, Patricia was born in Chicago on June 24, 1930. Six years later the family moved to Winnetka and lived there for decades. Pat attended Horace Mann, Crow Island, Skokie, and New Trier High Schools. Summers highlighted annual family vacations westward to national parks in Colorado and Montana. For college, Pat chose Oberlin, Ohio, graduating with a major in modern foreign languages. She earned a Master’s degree in Business from Simmons College, Boston on a scholarship from former department store retailer Carson, Pirie, Scott & Company. Later, she pursued advanced courses in history and education at the University of Illinois and Northwestern University. While in management training at Carson’s, she served as an assistant department manager. She then moved to San Francisco as assistant buyer at the Joseph Magnin, Inc., at the time a prominent women’s fashion retail organization, now defunct.

During college one summer Pat travelled to England, Holland, and France. Later she visited Spain and Portugal. On her return she was offered the position of teacher of marketing education in the Springfield, IL public schools. A year or so later she became a supervisor of vocational education for the State of Illinois, traveling to various high schools throughout southern Illinois. At this time Pat met Melvin Rath, CPA. They married in 1959, and moved to Winnetka. Soon Mel became a partner with the accounting firm then known as Alexander Grant in Chicago. The marriage lasted some 20 years, ending in divorce, but produced their greatest joy, son Eric Rath. During this time, Pat served on the Board of the Winnetka Public School Nursery and later as a Cub Scout den leader.

Pat then taught fashion, marketing education, and consumer behavior at the International Academy of Design and Technology, Chicago, where she also instituted classes in French language and culture, and at Columbia College in Chicago. In addition, she co-authored over a dozen text books on marketing, fashion merchandising, consumer behavior, and fashion importing and exporting for publishers such as McGraw Hill, Conde Nast, and Bloomsbury. She traveled extensively in Europe, Mexico, Scandinavia, Japan, and Hawaii, and taught in Paris and Provence. Her professional experience in fashion included management in retailing and wholesaling in Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco. Pat also wrote articles on fashion and lectured in English and French on topics such as French Couture and global fashion marketing.

In 1988 she married Philip Balsamo, Jr., a friend who reconnected from college days. Their merged families include Eric (Kiyomi) Rath, and step-families Philip III (Marsha), Cathy O’Neill (Patrick, deceased 2018), and Nicholas (Julie) Balsamo. Grandchildren include: Dana Rath, Leanne (Christopher) Groves, Matthew and Patrick O’Neill, Brian and Michelle Balsamo. Phil and Pat spent their leisure time attending the theater and their summers sailing on Lake Michigan with friends. They also travelled to Canada and Hawaii. Phil died in 2015, leaving warm recollections of their memorable years together.

In retirement, the organizations that engaged Pat’s time included the Alliance Française du North Shore and the League of Women Voters of Winnetka-Northfield, Kenilworth, where she served on the Board as Winnetka Issues chair, regularly attending and reporting on the Board of Trustees meetings and supervising the reporting of League Observers to the other local taxing bodies. She also served on the New Trier Township Oversight Committee from 2016-2022.

A memorial service will be held at a future date.