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Patricia Ryan Lindberg of Wainscott died on November 14 of internal injuries following an accident in her home six days earlier. She was 88.
Born in Hewlett, Mrs. Lindberg grew up in Rye, New York City, and Miami. Her father, John William Ryan, operated several successful haberdasheries in Manhattan. Mrs. Lindberg followed in the footsteps of her mother, Marion Kondolf Ryan, a music school graduate from Rochester, to become an accomplished pianist.
She attended Emma Willard School in Troy, was a 1939 graduate of the Spence School in New York City and attended Vassar College. One of the last women to attend Columbia’s business school before its admissions were restricted to graduate students, she received a Bachelor of Science from Columbia University in 1945. In addition, she took graduate courses toward a master’s degree in library science at Long Island University’s C.W. Post.
In 1943, she married Jean Melville Lindberg, a lieutenant in the U.S. Army, in Manhattan. The two had met in Virginia Beach, where Mrs. Lindberg was vacationing with her mother following the death of her father, and Mr. Lindberg was on a military furlough.
The couple spent the early part of their marriage in the Army’s Camp Stewart in Georgia, where Mr. Lindberg received anti-aircraft artillery training before being stationed abroad. Mrs. Lindberg later returned to Manhattan, where she volunteered as a nurse in the war effort and worked for New York Telephone.
After the war, the couple lived in New York City and gradually moved east, living in Forest Hills, Garden City, Upper Brookville and Roslyn. All the while, Mr. Lindberg commuted into Manhattan to work for Chase Manhattan Bank, where he rose from an entry level position to senior vice president, retiring after 40 years.
The couple had one child, a daughter, Marian, who now works as an attorney and associate director of philanthropy at The Nature Conservancy in East Hampton. After her husband’s death in 2000, Mrs. Lind- berg moved to Wainscott, where her daughter has owned a home since 1989.
Described by family members as elegant, kind, and independent-minded, Mrs. Lindberg enjoyed baking, gardening, classical music, reading, traveling, bridge, and going to the beach. In the company of her husband, she was an ever-striving golfer, known more for her efforts and self-deprecating humor than the accuracy of her shots, survivors recalled. Locally, she contributed to many charities and was a member of Guild Hall and the Ladies Village Improvement Society of East Hampton.
In addition to her daughter, she is survived by a grandson, Justin Melville Lindberg, an eighth grade student at Ross School; a niece, Susan Ryan Follett of Virginia; and two nephews, Dwight P. Ryan of White Plains and John W. Ryan III of Connecticut. She was predeceased by two brothers.
A memorial service was held on November 21 at Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church. Interment of ashes was next to those of her late husband in Locust Valley Cemetery’s Memorial Garden. In lieu of flowers, donations to the East Hampton Library, 159 Main Street, East Hampton, NY 11937 would be appreciated by the family.
on Nov 24, 2009