Pat Henderson

Patricia Henderson was raised by her single mother Percell, a nurse in Los Angeles, California. She never came to know her Prizefighter father Wilbur. She was beautiful, talented, bubbly and bright - and one of the kindest people you’d ever meet. I’m talking the kind of person who left fresh baked cookies in our mailbox for the mail person when she was still able to bake.

In her high school days she was a cheerleader, sang and played the cello, so it’s no surprise that she gravitated towards singing and performing for audiences as she became a young woman. She told me she used to love watching American Bandstand to see other teens dancing to her favorite artists as they sang and performed on stage. Those performances inspired her to start singing herself, and once she got to junior college she took singing very seriously, and was very, very good at it.

Patricia started out singing professionally with a couple of groups, The Young Americans, and the Doodletown Pipers (Top Row, third from the right)

Then she performed in her own duo, Pat and Cash, they performed in Playboy clubs and sang and danced their asses off for any and all audiences! During that time they also went over to Vietnam and performed for the U.S. soldiers serving there, something she was always very proud of, because she admired our country’s military very much.

She sang so well she became a professional backup singer, and worked with many popular bands and artists, and probably graced every variety show in the 70s. Carol Burnet, Glen Campbell, Donnie and Marie, you name it, if there was a variety show on in early to late 70s, she was probably on it!

One of her favorite stories she used to tell me involved a band she sang with, called The Babys and the album she sang on called Broken Heart. Something I was able to get in writing from her through texting:

“…there’s that short story I told you about when we went to the park one day and you were asking me about peoples initials on the tree you used to climb. And I said well when two people love each other sometimes they carve their initials on a tree. And you said that you would never do that because somebody would come along and chop the tree down and then you would have a broken heart, and I told them that and that’s why they named their album broken heart.”

Is that true? I have no idea, but she sang on that album, so I believe her.

She also sang on such iconic movie soundtracks such as Rocky and Grease, and sang backup for people like Barry Manilow, Burt Bacharach, and Olivia Newton John, and more. You’ll find her discography here. One album she sang lead vocals that remains my favorite collection of original songs this day, was the Jean Lexia Interpolation. It wasn’t embraced by the public, but was part of my own life’s soundtrack. One of the songs she sang on in Grease, “You’re the One That I Want” got plucked for reuse in the movie “Deadpool and Wolverine”!

But when the 80s arrived so did financial ruin for my parents, forcing us to flee Altadena and move to Seattle. Despite those tough times she did everything she could to raise me right and and keep a roof over my head. Not to mention she encouraged me to keep playing my own music, and always supported me by attending all my music concerts as a child. I’ll never forget the night I had a junior symphony concert at Ingraham High school extremely far from our home. A cousin was supposed to drop us off, but failed to show up. So at the last minute, she figured out which metro buses we needed to get us there. We stood in the rain, holding hands and waiting for buses. We got there at the very last minute, but we still arrived in time for my performance! I’ll never forget how determined she was to get us there, and how happy I was that she stuck by me in that moment, and so, so many others.

Her resilience was and always will remain an inspiration for me, because after all the hardships we endured in the 80s and 90s, she never gave up and never surrendered. In her mid 50’s she went back to college at Cornish and got her degree in musical theater, all while working a graveyard shift at a hotel. One of my favorite memories of my Mom is seeing her act in a stage play at Cornish that was so devastatingly poignant it brought me to tears. It was the first time I ever experienced such intense emotion witnessing a live performance. I’m also so grateful for how she worked so hard to keep a roof over my head throughout my youth and 20s. So it was a given to me that I could return the favor when she retired. She helped me purchase a place and we had a happy stable home together for about 15 years. Then Parkinson’s reared it’s ugly head, and took her from me on September 30, 2026.

Patricia Henderson was nothing but kindness and compassion personified throughout my life. A devout Christian she was dedicated to her Catholic faith in her later years, listening to mass and praying every day. I’ll miss getting her the Mexican food she loved, watching Seahawks games and Project Runway with her, and her caring and calming presence. She was always my biggest cheerleader, my best friend, and the one person on this earth who always believed in me. I will miss her with every ounce of my soul. I love you Mom.