Elaine Hunt 1927 – 2022

Readers will be sad to learn that Elaine Hunt, who lived in Evington for almost 60 years, has died.  She passed away peacefully at South Lodge Care Home on 20^th November 2022, three days after her 95^th birthday.

Elaine was (among other things) an inspirational Yoga teacher, story-teller, wordsmith and cryptic-crossword-solving genius.

As a qualified British Wheel of Yoga teacher, she taught adult classes at Judgemeadow Community College for nine years – and even in her 80s, would stand in for the regular tutor at short notice, if needed.  She also ran exercise sessions at Vista (the Resources Centre for the Blind) for 16 years, and – in her late 60s and early 70s – gave highly-praised talks on ’the value of exercise and relaxation in retirement’ to Voluntary Action Leicester’s pre-retirement courses at Leicester Adult Education College.

Elaine had a life-long passion for playing with words – and in her 40s, she turned her love of the English language into a mid-life career as a freelance writer.  From 1973 to 1982 she contributed articles to many national publications, including The Lady, Popular Gardening, and Yoga Today – for which she wrote extensively and learnedly on Yoga topics.  Teenage girls’ magazines, such as Jackie and Diana, published several of her stories as ‘Readers’ True Experiences’ (!), and her travel articles occasionally graced the pages of The Daily Telegraph.  She also wrote many feature articles for the Leicester Mercury, and even devised a word puzzle for the paper that she supplied every day for ten years; that’s over 3,000 puzzles in total!

Elaine was born in November 1927 to John and Margaret Johnson, and spent her early childhood in Humberstone.  After secondary school, she trained as a teacher at the newly-opened City of Leicester Teacher Training College, where she was in the first group of students to take the course.

Having gained her teaching certificate, Elaine taught at Heathfield Primary School in Nottingham from 1947 to 1955 – an experience she recounted in a series of hilarious stories.  During that time she met her husband, John, and they married in 1952.  Their two children, Warwick and Rebecca, were born in 1956 and 1959 – and in 1962, the family moved to Evington and settled in Ingarsby Drive.

John and Elaine were both keenly involved in the launch of the Evington Echo; John (who died in 2003) was a faithful distributer of the newsletter for many years, while Elaine wrote a series of articles about ‘Friends and Neighbours’ for the early editions.

A Quaker-style celebration of Elaine’s life was held at Great Glen Crematorium on Friday 16^th December 2022, when family members, longstanding friends, neighbours, Quakers and yoga colleagues shared fond memories of Elaine – and the warmth, wisdom, spirit and good humour she brought to our lives.

Warwick Hunt