A Tribute to Pat Rodrigues
1928 - 2007

      Eighteen years ago this past August, I met Pat Rodrigues for the first time.   I was interviewing for the executive director’s position with Pat serving as the Interim Director and Joe Gallo who was serving as the Board‘s Personnel Chairman.  It was a great interview.  It just felt like I knew Pat forever.  We laughed our way around the building sharing stories of our Boys & Girls Club experience.  At one juncture Pat turned the lights on in the boys’ locker room and a few of our creepy crawly friends scurried for the floor drains.  Pat told me “Don’t mind them, they’re just visiting” and I responded “that’s nothing. In Holyoke they’re the size of aircraft carriers.”  You should have heard her laugh.  Pat was old enough to be my mother.  They shared the same values and qualities.  It was the beginning of a great friendship.  I had the honor and privilege to work with Pat for the next five years until she retired to Rockport with her husband, Ray to enjoy her family and her grandchildren. My only regret is not having the opportunity to have worked with her longer.

      I have Pat to thank for a smooth and seamless transition to Ludlow.  Pat knew everybody and introduced me as a friend.  I met so many great people that I consider friends today.   Thanks to the stability she brought to our programs and staff I was able to concentrate my energy on learning my new role as executive director and working with my Board Chairman, Bob Carnevale and our board of directors to advance our strategic agenda.  I was very fortunate.  It was a great situation for a young executive.  I was surrounded by the very best of people.   Pat served as the Club historian linking me to the Club’s past.  The evolutions of our after school program under Mack Donnelly, Sue Coughlin and Pat’s wings remains today the very foundation of all our future programs.  Our preschool, kindergarten, vacation weeks,   before school, middle school and expanded summer camp were natural progressions of our after school program meeting the need of our working parent families and their children.   As time went by I had the opportunity to interject my ideas into our program.  We didn’t always agree and but I always valued Pat’s advice molded by her years of wisdom and experience.  When a decision was made whether she was for it or against, she was always a team player putting the club and our kids first and foremost.  

      More than anything Pat loved our kids and treated them like her own.  She was no nonsense and tough but always caring, loving and fair.  Her work in our after school and summer camp programs was legendary.  Our kids walk away from the Club with so many great memories including special events like the Rag Shag Parade/Haunted House, Turkey Shoot, Games Carnival, Christmas Dinner, Easter Egg Hunt, group plays, sleepovers, field trips and campouts.   There have been countless children who Pat watched grow up in our after school and summer camp programs in some cases, from kindergarten through college.   

      Pat’s body of work was much larger than the five years we shared together.  Pat’s history with the Club spanned over thirty- five years.  Pat worked for a short time under Joe Ross and for twenty + years under Mack Donnelly.  She wore many hats including secretary, bookkeeper, fund raiser, program director, assistant executive director and interim director. She sometimes did two jobs in one day.  She once told me she was program director by day and bookkeeper by night.   She did anything and everything for the Club. She was part of that core group including the likes of Eleanor Bennett, Jean Henriques and Sue Coughlin who were the backbone of the Club. From the Dinner Dances, Bazaars, Bingo and the Ladies Advisory whatever was needed got done.   

      This past month surrounded by her family, Pat succumbed to her second battle with cancer. 

      I want to offer my deepest condolences and sympathy to Pat’s husband, Ray and her children, Linda, Peter and Judy and their entire family.  I want to thank them for sharing this fabulous lady with us for all those years.   Our world and our community was a better place thanks to Pat.  

      Today I wanted to take a minute to remember this wonderful lady who was so dedicated to our children and our community.  I am asking all of you who knew Pat or who past through the club under her guidance to take a moment to remember and say a prayer of thanks for Mrs. Rodrigues.  

      A week after I wrote this tribute to Pat her daughter Judy informed us that her father, Ray Rodrigues had passed away eight days after her mother. Judy noted her father’s health had been deteriorating for a very long time but with his extreme sadness and grief over her mother’s death, he did not have the strength to recover. 

      For all of us who knew both Pat and Ray you realized right away what a wonderful relationship they had and how committed they were to each other and to their family.   Both my daughter Marjorie and my son, Jimmy grew up at the Club under Pat’s wing.  They both have so many fond memories of both Pat and Ray and our visits to their homes both in Springfield and Rockport.  

       Ray served as a corporator of the Boys & Girls Club and supported Pat and her work at the Club by volunteering countless hours throughout the years.   Like Pat, Ray was dedicated to our community demonstrated by his volunteer work in the Portuguese community, coaching youth sports, serving as a member of the board of both Ludlow Hospital and Ludlow Country Club. Professionally, Ray worked in real estate, insurance and development.   

In closing, I want to offer this Irish prayer to the wonderful memories Pat and Ray have provided my family and me.   God Bless you, Pat & Ray    
Jim Moriarty

Remembered Joy
Don't grieve for me, for now I'm free!
I follow the plan God laid for me.
I saw His face, I heard His call,
I took His hand and left it all...
I could not stay another day,
To love, to laugh, to work or play;
Tasks left undone must stay that way.
And if my parting has left a void,
Then fill it with remembered joy.
A friendship shared, a laugh, a kiss...
Ah yes, these things I, too, shall miss.
My life's been full, I've savoured much:
Good times, good friends, a loved-one's touch.
Perhaps my time seemed all too brief—
Don't shorten yours with undue grief.
Be not burdened with tears of sorrow,
Enjoy the sunshine of the morrow.