Virgina Anne Broyles, age 91, of Boydton passed away January 17, 2025. Other than great love for her family members (both the Wyne and the Broyles clans) and for any activities involving them, Virginia Anne wanted to be remembered for her life-long commitment to and service in the United Methodist Church. Her service occurred at all levels: the local church as well as District, Conference, and Jurisdictional activities, particularly in the United Methodist Women.

In high school, Virginia Anne served as the Farmville District President of the Methodist Youth. Meetings were held at the Blackstone Assembly Center where she went on to attend and teach at many, varied conferences until it closed in 2016.

Virginia Anne’s parents, James and Shirley Wyne, wanted her to go to college but didn’t know how they could pay for it. Her Methodist District Superintendent at the time believed strongly in her and encouraged her to continue her education. Knowing nothing about college but aware that Frank Osborne of Boydton went to Ferrum College, she picked that one! Farmville District scholarships paid for much of her collegiate education along with various work experiences. At Ferrum, she worked in the kitchen, making bread each morning. (Bread making became a long-term interest of hers.) Ferrum was a two-year college student at the time. Virginia Anne was admitted to High Point College which she had selected as her next step because one of her friends at Ferrum planned to continue there. She had in fact already paid tuition there, but her District Superintendent intervened. He believed Greensboro College had a better Religion Department, which was Virginia Anne’s main academic interest and convinced her to change her plan. At Greensboro, Virginia Anne continued working as part of paying for college. She put up the student mail every morning by 8 AM, worked in the bookstore, and was a hall monitor for three dorms. “I made rounds each night and told people to go to bed! A bell was rung each morning to wake us up. I often wondered why they didn’t just ring the bell to tell us it was time to go to bed. But then, I wouldn’t have had that job!” Virginia Anne graduated from Greensboro majoring in Religion and Philosophy.

During college, Virginia Anne represented the Southeastern Jurisdiction of the Methodist Church at a national Collegiate Methodist Student Conference held at Purdue University to which she travelled by train, and which ignited a life-long interest in traveling and appreciating other people and places.

After college, Virginia Anne served for a number of years as Director of Christian Education at Main Street Methodist Church in South Boston. She was admitted to and slated to attend Drew University in New Jersey for her Master of Divinity degree when “life intervened,” she says. She instead returned to her hometown of Boydton, VA when her father died to help support the family. There, she taught sixth grade full-time for four years. She once invited the new County Forester, Bert Broyles, to speak to her science class about the importance of trees to the environment. (She would come to consider this their first date!)

After her children were both of school age, Virginia Anne began a multi-decade journey as a substitute teacher, eventually serving almost exclusively at Bluestone Senior High School where she often did long-term substitutions for other teachers. Along the way, she also completed classes at the University of Virginia for certification as a guidance counselor though she never served in that role.

Virginia Anne served on countless local church committees, task groups, and projects. For decades, she served as a local church delegate to the Virginia Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church.

She also filled multiple roles for years in local, district, conference, and jurisdictional level activities for the United Methodist Women. This service included many trips around the country to meetings of the UMW at these various levels. She remembered that two highlights of her UMW involvement were work trips to the Red Bird Mission in Kentucky and educational seminars in New York City about the work of the UMW and other organizations around the world to address human need of all kinds. Virginia Anne also had great fulfillment from serving on the Board of the Wesley Foundation at Longwood College.

Perhaps Virginia Anne’s greatest ministry passion, however, was music. She began piano lessons in fifth grade. She continued study at Ferrum, adding organ as an elective to her curriculum. At Greensboro, she continued studying the organ repertoire and played for a church those two years, taking a city bus every Sunday morning. Virginia Anne’s love of music and life-long commitment to it was affirmed in 1999 when the Boydton Methodist Church recognized her for 50 years, at that time, of musical ministry in various capacities. She was in the choir at Boydton Methodist Church for many decades and could not wait to get there each Sunday to sing the hymns and anthems of her faith.

Virginia Anne’s life was full of faith, hope, and love, for her family, her church, and everyone she met.

She will be remembered and dearly loved, always.

A private graveside service will be held at Boydton Baptist Church Cemetery and a memorial service will be held at a later date.

(Virginia Anne requested that any memorial be made to the Red Bird Mission: Ways to Give | Red Bird

Mission or the Society of St. Andrew: Give Online | The Society of St. Andrew, Inc.) Wood Funeral Service is serving the family. Condolences may be expressed at www.woodfuneralservice.com