Family and friends joined together at the GDSC Grafton on Thursday September 17, to farewell the Clarence Valley’s oldest and much-loved resident Winifred Matilda Jefferies “Win”, who passed away on 11 September 2020 at the age of 108.

The service was conducted by Clarence Village Ltd Chaplain David Seymour who said that he had visited Win while she was in hospital recently and he spoke about a couple of his memories from that visit.

“When I walked in, I said, ‘Hi Win’ and she said, “Oh my gosh, I’ve got no make up on,” Mr Seymour said.

“I asked her if she would like me to pray for her and I asked her what she would like me to pray for and she replied, “pray to get me out of here”.

Mr Seymour said that in preparing his message, he had a list of different things (to help describe Win).

“When I came to the word ‘characteristics’, I immediately wrote beside it ‘fabulous’.

“Then when I came to her ‘interests’ – ‘fashion’ stood out and I think that by all the red and black (Win’s favourite colours) being worn today, show’s that,” he said.

Win’s granddaughter Glenda Rogan gave the eulogy.

Glenda said that her grandmother had always celebrated her birthday on August 24.

“Win was actually born on 23 August, not the 24th,” Glenda said.

“We discovered this when she was turning 100 and needed her birth certificate.

“She said that she wasn’t changing the date as she had celebrated her birthday on 24 August for the last 99 years,” she said.

Following on from the eulogy, Win’s nephew, local bush poet Bill Kearns read one of his poems, entitled ‘Dust’.

As the service concluded, a lone piper played Amazing Grace as Win’s coffin was escorted outside to the hearse and then on to the Clarence Lawn Cemetery.