Betty Fleming: 107 years ‘well lived’
Marlborough’s oldest person and a former Kapiti resident has died after what friends and family say were 107 years ‘‘well lived’’.
Betty Fleming, who lived through the national flu epidemic of 1918, the Great Depression and two world wars, died peacefully at the Ashwood Park Retirement Village last Monday.
Family friend Roger Brown said the former nurse left a mark on all she came into contact with.
‘‘She still had her memory and stories to the end. She was quite a character,’’ he said.
Fleming, nee Wilson, hailed from the Kapiti Coast and attended Queen Margaret College in Wellington.
It was there she met future husband Lindsay Fleming, of the Awatere Valley, who was boarding at Scots College.
The pair married in 1939. Longevity seemed to be in the family genes after sister Peg Griffin reached 110.
Griffin was thought to be the oldest person in New Zealand when she died near Wellington in 2014. The sisters were not outliers in the family tree, with two other sisters reaching 98 and 91.
Marlborough district councillor Jenny Andrews said so many long and rich lives in one family was a phenomenon.
Fleming’s mother lived to 90, her grandmother to 91 and greatgrandmother to 89. On her father’s side, her grandmother lived to 90.
‘‘She was a lovely looking person, people would always say they could not believe her Andrews said.
About 60 people attended a funeral service on Friday to age,’’ recognise the formidable legacy that Fleming left behind.
The amount of attendees was a good display of the impact she had, Andrews said.
‘‘There were a lot of people there from family, friends, staff and residents from the rest home, it was a fantastic tribute to the person she was,’’ she said.
Even well into her 90s, Andrews said Fleming would ride her scooter about town and continue to garden.
At 102, Fleming took a trip over the Tasman to attend her granddaughter’s wedding in Sydney.
Fleming moved into an apart- ment at the Ashwood Park Retirement Village in 2012, where she stayed until her death.
Although she had declined in recent months, Brown said Fleming was ready to go and died peacefully.
‘‘At 107 it was age that killed her,’’ he said.