Mr. Bradley Louis Clapham, 93, of Charlotte, NC, passed away Friday, December 13, 2024 at home.

Funeral service will be 11:00 am Friday, December 20, 2024 at M. L. Ford & Sons Funeral Home, 4820 Charlotte Highway, Lake Wylie, SC with the Rev. Sam Warner officiating.  Interment will be in Pleasant Hill Cemetery.   The family will receive friends 1 hour before the service.

Bradley was born August 19, 1931 on the farm during the depression.in Cedar Bluffs, NE, the seventh on nine children, to the late Charles Edward and Rose Dorothy Kolb Clapham.  He had to walk to school every day a mile up hill in both directions. Brad realized early that he did not want to be a farmer.

Brad did very well in school and played football and baseball.  After graduation from high school, his ability was recognized by the St. Louis Cardinals scouts who signed him to a professional contract and shipped him south to Tifton, GA.  In the off season, he attended Midland College in Fremont, NE where he worked towards an education degree.  He then taught school in the same one room schoolhouse that he had attended as a child.  Brad had an outstanding career which was interrupted by being drafted into the Army during the Korean War.  While in the Army, he continued to play baseball for the Army base teams, where he was Tournament MVP.  After discharge, he continued his professional career being sent to Rock Hill, SC where he met and married Anne.  He was promoted to the Charlotte Hornets, and then promoted to the Chattanooga, TN club where a contract dispute over a twenty-five-dollar salary increase lead him to retire and settle in Rock Hill, SC.

Later he and his family moved to Charlotte, NC where he became a very successful house painter and real estate investor.  He coached many children from Little League through American Legion.

He was preceded in death by a daughter, Leigh Ann Burns and siblings, Charlotte, Betty, Lloyd, Eldon, Wade, and Robert.

Survivors are his wife of 70 years, Amelia Anne Duncan Clapham; son Mark C. Clapham (Debra) of Charlotte, NC; sisters Jeannine Shanahan and Rose Mary Stokes; son-in-law Kenny Burns; grandchildren Randi Clapham, Matthew Clapham (Holly) and Andrew Burns (Tonya); and great grandchildren Brayden Lisk, Aria Lisk, and McKenzie Clapham.

Memorials may be made to First Presbyterian Church Belmont, 102 S Central Avenue, Belmont, NC 28012.

M. L. Ford & Sons Funeral Home, Lake Wylie, SC is serving the family of Mr. Clapham.

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