Boxer joins tributes as ‘inspirational’ Ada dies aged 101
TRIBUTES have been paid to inspirational charity volunteer Ada Gibson following her death last week aged 101.
Ada, a great, greatgrandmother and community stalwart, passed away from bowel cancer at Hope House in Claytonle-Moors early on Wednesday morning, November 9.
Ada learned to swim aged 75 and went on to raise thousands of pounds for various charities after she began completing sponsored swims at Mer- cer Hall Leisure Centre in the 1990s. When her health meant she could no longer swim Ada took up sponsored skipping to continue raising funds - until she developed bowel cancer six years ago.
Her daughter Barbara Wright, 74, said her ‘inspirational’ mum took on a new ‘lease of life’ when she started fundraising.
She said: “Mum did anything and everything. She raised money for epilepsy, arthritis and for cancer, all sorts of little charities that she supported and in her own way she did love people.
“Before that she was a seamstress all her life.
“In those days the man was the boss and the wife to stay at home and cook and look and after the children.
“When my father died my mum then came into her own being and it was then that she started swimming and fundraising. She got a new lease of life. It was very different from when we were growing up, when it came to her being in her 70s she loved being the centre of attention, and she was on the Jonathan Ross show and talking to Julian Clary. She loved the limelight.”
Ada was born in April in 1915 and grew up on the poverty line in Haslingden, leaving her family home at 14 after the death of her mother.
The father of a friend taught her to sew and she began a career as a seamstress.
Barbara said: “When she was a little girl her life was quite rough.
“She used to tell us that in an evening the workers that came in could sit round the table but my mum and her brother who were the youngest had to stand up and all they got to eat was the top of a boiled egg and a bit of bread – that was it.”
Ada married Thomas Gibson in the early 1940s and they stayed together until his death in 1971. She never remarried.
Barbara added: “I remember she used to skip round the park when she was 90 years old.
“I know she would be thrilled to bits to hear everybody phoning up to say nice things about her, she’ll be somewhere floating around watching us all.”
Ada’s funeral was due to take place at All Saints Church in Clayton-leMoors on Thursday, November 17 at 10.45am.
Barbara added: “I am hoping that there will be a lot of people to send her off. We don’t want it to be morbid, we want it to be a celebration of her life and all the wonderful things she did.
“My mum always used to say ‘start the day with a smile, smile at everyone and they will smile back’ so one of the songs that we are going to play is ‘Smile’.
SEE obituary on p12.