Funeral plea after death of popular ‘Jeanie Lush’
WELL-LOVED GRAN WAS CHARITY FAVOURITE
A WELL-LOVED woman could be robbed of her dying wish if loved ones can’t raise the cash to have her buried in a family plot.
When Jeanie Webster died of cancer last month, the news brought heartache to everyone involved with the People’s Kitchen, and other charities involved in sharing food with vulnerable people on Tyneside.
So popular, she was known as “Jeanie Lush” because of her lovely personality, and charity volunteers say she’ll be greatly missed.
Jeanie, who lived in the Bensham area of Gateshead all of her 67 years, didn’t have an easy life.
A regular face at the People’s Kitchen, as well as other soup kitchens in the city, she had a difficult first marriage and lost her second husband at a young age.
Despite that, she was always happy to help others.
“She was really well loved, everybody knew my mam,” her son, Arthur Anderson, said.
“She used to walk over to Newcastle to go to the People’s Kitchen. She loved it, that’s where she felt happy. She would go down and help them at Christmas, she felt it was her duty to help out. She had nothing but she would help anybody, she would listen to anybody who came to her with a problem. She was just lush, and that’s what we called her, Jeanie Lush.
“She lived for her grandbairns. Even at 67 she would come and see us every day. I will never forget that she was always, always there for us – she would be there for anybody.
“She had a heart of gold, and she will be a big miss in my life.”
With three surviving children, 15 grandchildren and two greatgrandchildren, Jeanie was known as “the don” of her family – a matriarch who ruled the roost.
Arthur believes she hid the fact she had been diagnosed with cancer to avoid upsetting her loved ones. She died just two weeks after being admitted to hospital with chest problems.
“It’s hard to believe she’s gone, she died in my arms and I just can’t understand it. Every time I hear the door I look up, thinking it’s her,” said Arthur.
Family say Jeanie is facing a “pauper’s funeral” – being cremated, without a service – despite her last wish being to be buried alongside family.
Arthur said: “She desperately wanted to be buried with her brother – her nephew’s family are more than happy for her to use the plot, but we don’t have the money to pay the undertakers for the burial.”
Soup kitchen volunteer Andrea Wright set up a fundraising page in the hopes of giving popular Jeanie a more fitting memorial.
Andrea said: “Jeanie spent her life struggling financially, she was a very proud person and didn’t like asking for help but unfortunately she was forced to do so just to get by.
“She spent many years having to access soup kitchens and charities to help feed herself and her family.
“Jeanie was well known and very much loved by her friends and the community.
“It breaks my heart to think that she can’t be laid to rest with her other family members which was her dying wish.”
Money is being raised for Jeanie’s funeral at www.gofundme.com/ jeanie039s-funeral