Cadden Sr., William Michael

William “Bill” Michael Cadden Sr., 84, of Blacksburg, died Friday, May 15, 2015, at the age of 84. Born June 22, 1930 in Brooklyn, N.Y., he married the girl down the street, Clare Marie Wulff, February 1, 1958 and was married for fifty-three years until her passing in 2011. Together they had seven children and nine grandchildren.

Bill attended St. John’s University in New York where he earned a bachelor’s degree in Accounting. He served as an enlisted man stationed at the Pentagon during the Korean War.

Active in charity work, Bill served as the treasurer for Big Brothers/Big Sisters in Suffolk, N.Y., was a lifetime member of the Knights of Columbus and was active as a fourth-degree knight, attaining the title of Grand Knight.

He was very active in the Catholic Church, as both a member of St. Edward the Confessor Church in Syosset, New York and St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Blacksburg. The nephew of a bishop, Bill enjoyed quizzing his seven children on the history of the Catholic Church.

Bill lived a life of seeking out and rising to new challenges: he was a working class kid who rose to respected positions in accounting and finance, including as an executive of financial services companies and president of his own brokerage; he was a land-lubber who decided to learn to sail in his forties and then race sailboats around Long Island, and he was a city kid who in his fifties decided to raise cattle in Virginia where he sent six of his children to attend Virginia Tech.

The Catholic Church and his extended and immediate families were the abiding interests and devotions of his life, and he was encouraging and generous to the needs of both church and family over the course of his long life. His last efforts for the Church were to help found and sit on the Board of the St. John Neumann Academy in Blacksburg, which gave him great joy in his last years.

Bill is survived by his seven children William Jr., Stephen, Michael, Kenneth, Thomas, Mary, and Anastasia; he is also survived by nine grandchildren as well as his older sister, Kathleen.

A funeral mass will be held Saturday, May 23, 2015 at 8 a.m. at St. Mary’s Catholic Church with Father Remi Sojka officiating. Interment will follow in the Memorial Gardens of the New River Valley, Blacksburg.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to St. John Neumann Academy, 2470 Ramble Road, Blacksburg, VA 24060.

The family will receive friends Friday, May 22, 2015 from 5 to 8 p.m. at McCoy Funeral Home, 150 Country Club Drive, SW, Blacksburg.