Joan Merryweather, age 85, passed away on Sunday, May 12, 2019 at Swedish Hospital in Seattle, Washington. Joan was born in Aldershot England, in the county of Hampshire on September 30, 1933 to Margaret (Nan) & Jessie Merryweather. She grew up in a house called Ivanhoe in the little town of Corfe Mullen outside Bournemouth, in Southern England in the county of Dorset. She had two older siblings Peter and Mary.
While growing up, WWII was raging all through Europe. Joan and Mary told us how they would count the German bomber planes as they flew over the south coast of England on their way to bomb the northern factories supplying England with weaponry. Unfortunately, if the bombers didn’t release their bombs on their targets, they would drop the bombs anywhere in England on their way back to the continent. She had neighbors who were killed by a few of those bombs.
After the war, her father decided to immigrate to Canada and then to the US. Jessie couldn’t get a good job, so he decided to go back to England. The story goes Joan put her foot down and refused to go home. She was 12 or 13 by then. Nan wouldn’t leave without Joan, so Jessie left for England. Mary had become a war bride and had a daughter named Margaret. They all decided to travel across the country to Seattle. Joan got a job with Sears and stayed there for 47 years until she retired.
Once retired, Joan’s life centered around two main activities. One was taking care of the garden which included mowing the big lawn, planting the flowers and vegetables and creating the beautiful porch flower pots. She did such a good job of growing tomatoes, we always had more than enough. The second was taking care of the various rescued dogs that we acquired throughout the years. This included walking all the dogs in the arboretum every weekend. She loved all the dogs. She always joked that she preferred dogs over humans. We all thought that she would have many more years of gardening and taking care of the dogs but sadly we were wrong. We believe that Joan and all the dogs that are no longer with us are happy together in heaven…. It’s pretty crowded because we’ve had a lot of dogs!
She is survived by her older sister Mary Barre and nieces and nephews in both the US and England.
In lieu of flowers, please donate to any animal charity.
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