"Miss Pat," after spending years in church and social work in Perry County, has served the people of Knott County for the past 34 years in a variety of ways with her bible in her hand and love in her heart.  Miss Pat has taught bible classes in the schools, established bible and Social Centers and a Sunday School, help to begin a church, worked with school nurses and doctors, provided a wide range of social missionary service and been active with the Boy Scouts, 4-H, and homemaker clubs.

Sally Patterson left her native Ireland during the Depression there in 1930 after just turning 19 years old. While raised in a church family Miss Pat did not accept Jesus Christ as her savior until 1932, in Philadelphia. She graduated from the Philadelphia College of the  Bible and completed one year of nursing training with hopes to be a  missionary in Africa. In Philadelphia, she learned that a Perry          
County woman was sick and wanted someone to continue her ministry and school work.  Miss Pat Arrived in Perry County in 1940 with $10 in her pocket.  She spent five years teaching in the public schools before working 12 years in a children's home in Lost Creek (this was before the existence of child welfare and government social services).  Miss Pat  worked with the Rev. and Mrs. Ernest Hunter in Perry County.  She helped start a church at Cockle's Fork at Ned.

She worked with Camp Nathanael in Knott County, and at the urging of the director, Robert Beckwith, began her work there.  She came to Pippa Passes at the request of nurses Evelyn Mautrum and Ivalene Caudill in 1958.  Miss Pat Taught in the schools and began a Sunday  School that was housed in two rooms of the Knott High School.  She helped Commodore and Jeanette Slone begin the Caney Baptist  Church, which then included Miss Pat's Sunday School. Miss Pat opened the house to aid those going to school or working the community.  She began a youth center in Hollybush. After the Caney Church began, she started Bible centers in Slone's Fork and Watts Fork.  The Slone Fork Bible Center is still in operation.  At the request of Alice Lloyd College director Dr. William Hayes, Miss Pat began 20 years of service keeping the college library open in the evening hours.  Miss Pat thanks the community for being so kind to her and the parents for having trust in her to work with their children. For over one-half a century, "Miss Pat"  has served her Lord and the people in Eastern Kentucky with love and hard work.

Corbett Mullins
June 6, 2003