Grace’s Obituary Grace Lynch, 85, passed from this life at Virginia Mennonite Retirement Community on May 4, 2019. She was born Eleanor Grace Shenk on March 3, 1934 in Denbigh, VA to the late Ezra C. and Pauline Mast Shenk. At the age of fourteen her family moved to Harrisonburg, VA.
From a young girl helping to care for her siblings until the end of her life, Grace was a “nurse”. Formally it began with graduating from Eastern Mennonite High School in 1952, then a two year nursing degree from Rockingham Memorial Hospital, a B.S. from Eastern Mennonite College (now University), a Masters from the Medical College of Virginia and she completed all but her dissertation in a doctoral program at the University of Delaware where she met her husband on a volleyball court. Mennonite Voluntary Service called to her in 1958 and she spent a year in Arizona serving the Navajo and Spanish speaking migrants.
She then worked at RMH, went back to Arizona to work for a year, taught at MCV School of Nursing, and from 1967 to 1969 helped to set up the Nursing Program at EMC. She taught nursing at the University of Delaware from 1971 to 1980. Grace changed careers in 1980 and became a mental health counselor.
At the end of her working career she worked for a community based mental health facility in Kensington, PA serving the disadvantaged. She was a longtime member of Germantown Mennonite Church in Philadelphia, PA. On October 19, 1974 she married David M. Lynch who survives her.
She is also survived by a brother, Carl Shenk and his wife, Shirley of Crossville, TN; sister Elizabeth (Nora) Schenk of Rainier, WA; and local sisters, Ruth Shenk and Gladys Wyse and husband John M.; six nieces and nephews. Grace loved her dogs, was an avid gardener, loved to read and camp. Starting in 2007 she started having difficulty speaking and by 2012 she had grave difficulty speaking and began choking when she ate and drank; in 2014 she was diagnosed with Progressive Bulbar Palsy, a variant of ALS.
For the last four years of her life she could not speak and was on a feeding tube. Grace fought with courage the decline in her health and was graceful through it all. Grace and David moved from Abington, PA to VMRC in 2012 to be close to her family and her beloved Shenandoah Valley.
A memorial service to celebrate her life will be held at Strite Auditorium at VMRC on Saturday, June 15 at 1:30 pm. A reception and visitation will follow. In lieu of flowers the family requests memorial donations be made to: The ALS Association – DC/MD/VA Chapter, 30 W. Gude Drive, Suite 150, Rockville, MD 20850.
Those wishing may share a memory or online condolence with the family by visiting www. mcmullenfh.com Arrangements entrusted to the McMullen Funeral Home.
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