Janet Mills: “Today, I rise to recognize and remember Patricia Sutherlin McRee. Patricia Sutherlin McRee, a 30-year resident of…”

“Today, I rise to recognize and remember Patricia Sutherlin McRee. Patricia Sutherlin McRee, a 30-year resident of Oviedo, and a constituent of mine, passed from us earlier this week. Patricia moved to the Space Coast in 1960 to teach at Melbourne High School, where she met a young Army officer who had been mobilized and sent to Florida during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Patricia took her charm and commitment to service with her all over this Nation and overseas as an Army spouse. She organized support for families whose husbands were serving in Vietnam alongside her beloved Army husband, Marshall McRee. She mobilized love and comfort for new widows and fatherless children traumatized by the sudden loss of a serviceman killed in action. At every military base that the Army sent Patricia and Marshall to, she was a leader, a servant, and an essential part of the fabric of that community. In my district of Oviedo, Patricia served as leader of the Oviedo Women's Club and, for many years, organized the Great Day in the Country Festival to fundraise for that organization. She made every duty station a better place through her service, and she made central Florida a better place. My heartfelt condolences to her son-in-law, Congressman Brandon Williams, and his wife in this loss. May God bless her. Rest in peace. ____________________”