Bradman first met Jessie Martha Menzies in 1920 while she boarded with the Bradman family, to be nearer to high school in Bowral. The couple married at St Paul's Anglican Church at Burwood, Sydney on 30 April 1932. at some stage in their 65-year marriage, Jessie became "intelligent, reliable, selfless, and specially, uncomplicated...she was the proper foil to his focused, and once in a while mercurial man or woman". Bradman paid tribute to his wife numerous instances, as soon as pronouncing succinctly, "i might by no means have performed what I accomplished with out Jessie".
The Bradmans lived within the same modest, suburban house in Holden avenue, Kensington Park in Adelaide for all however the first three years in their married lifestyles. They skilled personal tragedy in raising their youngsters: their first-born son died as an little one in 1936, their second son, John (born in 1939) shrunk polio, and their daughter, Shirley, born in 1941, had cerebral palsy from birth. His family call proved a burden for John Bradman; he legally changed his ultimate call to Bradsen in 1972. even though claims have been made that he have become estranged from his father, it turned into more a count of "the pair inhabiting special worlds". After the cricketer's demise, a collection of private letters written through Bradman to his near buddy Rohan Rivett among 1953 and 1977 changed into launched and gave researchers new insights into Bradman's own family existence, together with the pressure between father and son.
Bradman's reclusiveness in later life is partially due to the continuing health problems of his wife, particularly following the open-heart surgery Jessie underwent in her 60s. lady Bradman died in 1997, aged 88, from cancer. This had a dispiriting impact on Bradman, however the courting with his son progressed, to the volume that John resolved to exchange his call returned to Bradman. due to the fact his father's dying, John Bradman has emerge as the spokesperson for the family and has been concerned in protecting the Bradman legacy in some of disputes. the connection among Bradman and his wider own family is much less clear, despite the fact that 9 months after Bradman's death, his nephew Paul Bradman criticised him as a "snob" and a "loner" who forgot his connections in Bowral and who failed to attend the funerals of Paul's dad and mom.