Jeanie Stoate

Jeanie Fraser Cameron Stoate

In Ottawa suddenly on December 7th, 2015, in her 91st year, after a long and happy life. Born in Rannoch, Scotland on Feb. 8th, 1925, her Highland childhood was interrupted by the early loss of her mother and the Depression, which sent her and three of her four brothers to London. She spent the war years in the Women’s Army Corps in Egypt and as a radio operator in the D-Day invasion. Afterwards, she met the love of her life, Courtney Stoate, who asked her to marry him on their second date. She said yes, and they married in 1949. This year they celebrated 66 years of marriage, not one of them boring. On Courtney’s departure from the RAF in 1955 the couple and their two sons emigrated to Perth, Australia, but in 1961 Jean spotted an ad for a teaching job for Courtney in Montreal, and the family, now with a daughter, immigrated to Canada. She fell in love with the country, as the couple lived in Aurora, Oakville and finally Ottawa to be near their daughter, and spent summers on Lake Weslemkoon, her New Loch Rannoch. Their life was full of fun and adventure, including a wonderful sabbatical year in Aix-en-Provence in 1970-71, which enriched and inspired all our lives forever.

The world has lost a pure heart. She was the most loving and supportive of mothers and grandmothers, teaching forgiveness, tolerance and kindness for all. Our childhood memories are of efforts at discipline collapsing in laughter. An active, curious intelligence illuminated all her thoughts and actions. We were the most fortunate of children. She lived for her husband and for her children and grandchildren, with little thought for herself, working outside the home all her life to give us a life she never had as a child. She was the glue that bound the extended Cameron family around the world, with telephone calls and letters and later through her remarkable facility with email, Skype and Facebook.
She will be deeply missed by all of them, but especially by Courtney, who will forever miss the smile he fell in love with 67 years ago, and by Christopher (Patricia Harbman), Timothy (Edwina), Jocelyn (Michael Trepanier), and her granddaughters, Katharine, Sarah (Magnus Karlsson) and Hayley.

A memorial service will be held at the Ward Funeral Home, 109 Reynolds St., Oakville at 4 pm on Tuesday December 15th. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, cysticfibrosis.ca.