Obituary of Helen Pankus Bagdonas

Helen Pankus Bagdonas April 29, 1930 – June 24, 2014 Born in Maspeth (Queens, NY) to a young married couple, Sophie and Francis Pankus, who had recently emigrated from the then Russian-dominated Lithuania, in search of a new life of opportunities. Unfortunately, the Great Depression had already become the strong headwind, which began a strong spiritual development for this growing family. One year later, they welcomed the birth of her brother Alfred, but those joys were short-lived as her father died prematurely of advanced malignancy when she was only two years old. Her penniless, non-English speaking mother had to become the wage earner, without the tools of education or prior work experience, and was a good steward of scarce resources. They moved into a cold water flat in Brooklyn, and struggled to find coal for the oven, which provided their only means for heat and cooking. They survived on staples of potato pancakes and homemade beet soup, while being welcomed by the Lithuanian Community they had found in Annunciation Parish (www.nyapreiskimo.com). She graduated Bushwick Community High School, actively dated, and had a seven-year courtship with Albin A. Bagdonas, who graduated medical school right before they married in June/1955. Her work with the Singer Sewing Company significantly supplemented the wages of her husband surgeon in training, until he joined Drs. Zuflacht and Zola in private practice in Long Island. They moved to Rockville Centre in 1964, and she has been a very well known and active homemaker in that community. Family relationships have been most highly valued by Helen, as her three children married, and blessed her with many adoring grandchildren. Her extended family of relatives, friends, acquaintances, and bridge-playing inner circle of women cherished her altruism and her cheerful disposition. When she became a widow in 2006, her passion for action continued, as she always kept a heavily booked social calendar. A diagnosis of metastatic lung cancer in 2012 did not dissuade her from enjoying all that life had to offer her; as she received treatment, she perennially uplifted those around her. Even her final days in Hospice at North Shore/LIJ were characteristically spent socializing, and thanking God for a full life. She is survived by her three children Dr. Richard A. Bagdonas, Mr. John P. Bagdonas, and Mrs. Barbara Kogut, her thirteen grandchildren, and her loving brother, Alfred H. Pankus.