Inside the Undertakers, Lymns

[DAVIDW 1,690]

Just started on BBC1 , Stacey Dooley confronting her own worries of death is at Lymns undertakers.

[Jill Sparrow 10,309]

Saw this on the BBC News website. I always feel sorry for people who are terrified of dying. Wonder if they were terrified of being born?  Once here, you have to leave again. Death has never bothered me. It's just part of a cycle to my mind. I can't see how hanging round the funeral parlour is going to allay one's fears of dying. Each to their own. I hope it makes her feel better in some way.

[Cliff Ton 10,478]

I didn't watch it at the time, but I'll have a look on iPlayer.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001s7r1/stacey-dooley-inside-the-undertakers

[plantfit 7,629]

I was offered a job at A W Lymns when I was an apprentice mechanic, Mr Lymn had an account at the garage I worked in for fuel for all his Rolls Royce cars, Mr Lymn  himself though drove a humble Rover 2000, the job he offered me was driver /mechanic. very nice bloke as was Mr Rose his son in law (who I think now runs the business or his son does)

[Jill Sparrow 10,309]

Wasn't the firm actually known as Lymn & Rose at one stage?  Not recently, though.

[philmayfield 6,184]

Lymn and Rose are one of many companies in the group. The chairman is Nigel Lymn Rose. Go online and look up ‘Company Check’ and view all of the companies and the directors past and present. The current net worth of the group is £20 million. I remember Jacki Lymn Rose, Nigel’s sister, used to be a director of Sherwood Flying Club as was I but not at the same time.

[Jill Sparrow 10,309]

I think I'm possibly remembering seeing his name, which includes both Lymn and Rose.

[philmayfield 6,184]

I sometimes see Nigel in his Bentley, NLR1. There’s money in funerals!

[Jill Sparrow 10,309]

Of course there is. We all have to go sometime!!

[DAVIDW 1,690]

Can't see any reference to it being called Lymn and Rose but director,  George Rose was son in law to Harold Lymn (son of founder Arthur Lymn).

The current chairman , Nigel Lymn Rose, featured in the BBC programme.

 

A time line here from 1999:

 

A SUCCESS STORY ...

1907 Arthur William Lymn starts his undertakers in Goose Gate , next to Jesse Boot's first chemist shop .

 

1915 The firm expands and moves to new premises in Bath Street . New premises are acquired in Robin Hood Street and Handel Street for coffin manufacturing and horse stables .

 

1918 The world - wide flu epidemic breaks out . Harold Lymn is released from the Royal Naval Air Service to deal with the deaths in Nottingham .

 

1929 Arthur Lymn dies and leaves the firm to wife Louisa and son Harold . 

1939 Louisa dies and Harold becomes sole proprietor .

 

1958 Lymns becomes a limited company . Harold is managing director , his son Douglas and son - in - law George Rose are directors.

 

1976 Harold dies and Douglas and George become chairman and managing director . 

1977 The company moves to new premises in Robin Hood House .

 

1981 Douglas retires and , in 1982 , Nigel Lymn Rose ( George and Sheila's son ) joins the business .

 

1984 A W Lymn is the first UK funeral directors to be awarded BS5750

 

1998 Lymns buys the latest computer equipment to engrave headstones . 
 

[philmayfield 6,184]

It’s Lymn Rose Funeral Services Ltd. but that’s one of ten companies in the group. They’re all available to be seen on ‘Company Check’.

[Beekay 5,172]

I've just watched CTs link to the Stacey Dooley visit to Lymns . Stacey mentioned near the end of the programe, after the funeral of Lexy, how hard it must be to say goodbye to your own child. Well, I've done it twice. Watching the programe brought it all back to me, even though it was 45 and 33 years ago respectively, youngest son age 9 and oldest son age 23.

It never gets any easier. There are bad times and there are good times. The only consolation is that the bad times get less . Yes, both our kids were disabled and it was a struggle at times. But I don't regret one minute.

[plantfit 7,629]

A very sad post Barrie

 

Rog

[IAN FINN 817]

I am lost for words Beekay just treasure those times together. Our grandson was born with a diaphragmatic hernia ten percent chance to live but he survived after years of operations many body scars but it has left him partially deaf due to the medications he was on he is now 18 and just graduated from High School.

[Jill Sparrow 10,309]

We get used to expecting our children to outlive us (not that I have any) and I know Beekay has suffered the trauma of seeing both his sons go ahead of himself and his wife.

 

It makes me think about my great grandmother, Lucy Saunt, who gave birth to twelve children, watched six of them die as babies, saw her 14 year old son die of a glioma, lost her 24 year old son on the battlefields of The Great War and ended up at Bagthorpe suffering from dementia. Is it any wonder?  Yet Lucy is not in any way outstanding in her loss. Many mothers in those days suffered worse losses than she did.  Death, in those days, was truly part of life. The deceased remained in the house until the burial and there was no clinical, neat and tidy removal to the funeral parlour at a hideous cost.  Death has become more difficult for us to deal with as a result, perhaps.

[MargieH 7,612]

I was taken to see our dead neighbour in his own bedroom surrounded by candles.  That would be around 1952/53.  
Then when I was 23 I went with my parents to see my auntie in her coffin in her front room.  That was in 1966 .  

When my dad died in 1984, - he was living with us - it was very late evening so my mum and I decided to leave him in the bedroom until the morning before we called the undertakers.  I laid him out and he looked very peaceful.  The doctor who confirmed the death was a bit surprised we didn’t want to have dad taken away immediately….

 

 

[Cliff Ton 10,478]

My mother died in a nursing home and on the day she passed away I was asked to go there and deal with a few formalities.

 

One unexpected thing which cropped up when I arrived was being asked 'Do you want to look at the body ?'.  It took me by surprise because I hadn't expected it, but I said 'No'. Not because I was worried or freaked out or emotional, but simply because I couldn't think what I 'd do there.

 

I'd just look and nod and mumble around, and then say 'Ok, that's that then.'

[MRS B 532]

I was asked the same thing when my mum passed away and both my brother and I declined. I always think it’s not advisable as that would be the last thing you remember. We did have her ashes in a lovely flowery box for a couple of weeks though by the French doors  in our dining room as there was a delay with Wilford Hill for the scattering. The sun used to stream through first thing in the mornings and I used to go in there and say “Morning mother” which I actually found quite comforting. Everyone deals with grief in different ways I guess.

[Beekay 5,172]

4 hours ago, plantfit said:

A very sad post Barrie

 

Rog

Was'nt meant to be Rog., I was just telling it how it was. Certainly had no intention of posting a sob story and definitely not after sympathy, although I do appreciate kind words. In the case of our youngest boy, Colin, I recieved a phone call at 3.45 am from a faceless, charmless nurse who simply said, " Mr.King, just calling to say your son has passed away". And that was about it. Was told not to go in to City hospital until after 8.30. It happened at Christmas 1978, and thats why we keep a low profile over Christmas.  Our eldest lad, Andrew died in my arms at Penbury hospital, Kent, on 27th May 1990.

After spending most of the day with him, we went home about 9.30pm., as I still had my job to do. We were called back about 10.15pm and told we had better get back to the hospital as things did'nt look good. Andrew died about 11.30pm. We left the hospital about half past midnight and asked to come later in the morning.

[MRS B 532]

Barrie, we’ve had our conversations about your two boys. My thoughts are the same as always mate. I know I moan sometimes about still having my daughter living at home at 36 but kinda makes me grateful and brings me down to Earth when I think of you.

 

Mrs B

[Jill Sparrow 10,309]

Some friends of mine had to deal with the demise of a chap who was the second husband of a relative a few years ago. He lived in Eastwood, quite near to Malcolm, The Pianoman, on the main Nottingham Road. An awkward old boy, he lived into his nineties and had my friends running round like blue ar*ed flies for months before his passing.  He did have relatives of his own but they lived down south and, basically, didn't want to know.

 

My friends arranged the funeral and the relatives said they intended to have the ashes interred within the family plot in Ware. Intended, that is, until they found out how much it was going to cost. Then, suddenly, it became too much trouble to do anything with them. My friends suggested scattering the ashes around the roses in the garden of his house in Eastwood before it was sold, as he'd  always been a keen gardener. No. His relatives didn't like that idea. They wanted to arrange something else.

 

Four years on, the ashes reside in my friends' loft and look likely ever to remain so.

 

Bizarrely, two years after the chap's demise, my friends received a letter that had been forwarded from his old address.  It was from a former colleague of his who was unaware of his death.  My friends rang him and explained the situation. They had been through the deceased's address book and notified everyone who was contactable of the funeral arrangements but the former colleague was not in the book and therefore remained unaware of events.

 

On learning of the death, the colleague was most upset and asked where his chum had been buried as he wanted to go and pay his respects. My friends explained that, due to the family's prevarication, the remains hadn't been interred anywhere and were currently in their loft.  The colleague was clearly distressed about that and said he would like to say goodbye to his old chum. We envisaged my friends providing tea and cakes in their loft while the former colleague chatted about old times with the box!

 

The family has now completely lost interest. Whilst speedily holding out their clammy little paws for their share of the not inconsiderable proceeds of sale of the deceased's property, they have conveniently forgotten the fancy box containing his ashes. Those remains have found, it would seem, their forever home. In the loft.

[Gary Baldy 17]

On 11/10/2023 at 3:12 PM, philmayfield said:

Lymn and Rose are one of many companies in the group. The chairman is Nigel Lymn Rose. Go online and look up ‘Company Check’ and view all of the companies and the directors past and present. The current net worth of the group is £20 million. I remember Jacki Lymn Rose, Nigel’s sister, used to be a director of Sherwood Flying Club as was I but not at the same time.

Jackie was in my year at school, she was known as Jackie Rose for a while, and later as Jackie Lymn Rose. She was kind enough to send a message at my mum's funeral a couple of years ago, even though we hadn't been in touch since leaving school in  1972.

[Cliff Ton 10,478]

Death seems to be an expanding business.

 

At Clifton, Lymns are having a new office built on the site of a former petrol station, which is quite nostalgic for me. I knew that site as a petrol station for as long as I can remember - I filled up there when I had my first car back in the 70s.

 

 

It also shows how the Clifton demographic has changed; fewer kids and more oldies.

[Jill Sparrow 10,309]

Nothing is certain, except death and taxes!  

[MRS B 532]

On the subject of death Jill, think of the first three letters of Funeral. Then you see it in a different light.