J. Vernon Patrick Jr., a Birmingham lawyer and longtime Mountain Brook resident, died on October 7 in Houston. He was 95.
Mr. Patrick grew up in Ensley, graduated from Harvard College and Harvard Law School, and clerked for Justice Hugo L. Black before practicing law in Birmingham for more than fifty years. In 1963, while living in Vestavia, he helped lead Public Education Peacefully, a citizens’ effort to keep the area’s public schools open as they desegregated. He received death threats for that work. He and his wife of 49 years, Sylvia Brown Patrick, were longtime supporters of the arts and civic life in Mountain Brook and Birmingham. Sylvia was a founding member of the Guild of the Birmingham Music Club.
A memorial service will be held at First Presbyterian Church of Birmingham on a date to be announced, and he will be laid to rest beside his beloved wife Sylvia at Elmwood Cemetery.
