Pakenham Village Tributes : Margaret Gore West

An Ode to Maggie
Dear Margaret West
Came to rest
On an August day
Margaret West she was the best
Of that many do say

Some called her Maggie
Some Duchess
Some a lovely old gal
Which way or that
Where ere she was at
She was everyone's pal

Dear David her son
Looked after that gal
For two years or more
We may be inclined
To wish him peace of mind
Of that we are certain and sure

Goodbye dear Mags
You have given us fun
And laughter and much much more
To you we say thanks
For the love in your heart
And in Heaven you'll have glories in store

Margaret Gore West who passed away on the 21 st August was an exceptional woman. A woman of many talents including a car mechanic, Maggie as we all knew her and her husband Alan who passed on in 1991 came to Pakenham to settle, after many years of travelling the world with the RAF, in the summer of 1979. Although Alan was working, cycling to Honnington every day, Maggie soon found employment at Nether Hall and as was her way she soon made very good friends. Maggie was a very inclusive person with a huge personality for a small person and as the Nether Hall club began to run down, Maggie accepted an offer from the Post Office to work there where she stayed for some years, working behind the retail counter with Fay Currle and latterly behind the Post Office counter with Jan or Max Bacon. Maggie was involved with the W.I. always attending the meetings, with Pakenham Players, then directed by Frances Brown, she for at least one production made all of the costumes for that particular production.

Maggie with her great friend Connie Yates were regular customers of The Fox where Maggie would regularly treat her fellow members of the public bar to a song or two. Then there was the lunch club with her friends llsa Snowdon, Gladys Edwards, Joyce Dash, Connie Yates and their host Pauline Shackleton. In the last two years of her life when she was housebound her great friend Pauline Freeman whom she described as one of her two bosses, together with son David, made every effort to encourage a stubborn Maggie to arise from her sitting room and venture outside.

David and Pauline and daughter Judy deserve great credit for all of their care and encouragement and love over the last years of Maggie's life, together with the home in Stowmarket where she passed away.

PV&CN - October 2014