| Eve Branson | |
| Caption: | Branson in 2013 |
| Birth Name: | Evette Huntley Flindt[1] |
| Birth Date: | 12 July 1924[2] [3] |
| Birth Place: | Edmonton, Middlesex, England |
| Death Place: | United Kingdom |
| Occupation: | Founder and director of the Eve Branson Foundation Philanthropist Child welfare advocate |
| Boards: | International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children |
| Children: | 3, including Richard and Vanessa |
Evette Huntley Branson (née Flindt; 12 July 1924 – 8 January 2021)[4] was a British philanthropist, child welfare advocate, and the mother of Richard Branson.[5]
Branson was born in Edmonton, Middlesex (now London Borough of Enfield, Greater London), England, the daughter of Dorothy Constance (née Jenkins) (19 June 1898 - August 1997) and Major Rupert Ernest Huntley Flindt (born 11 St Faith's-road, West Norwood, 28 December 1890 - 19 October 1966).[1] [6] As a young adult, she served in the Women's Royal Naval Service (WRENS) during World War II. After the war ended, she toured West Germany as a ballet dancer with Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA).[7] [8] She later became an airline hostess for British South American Airways. After marrying, Branson ran a real estate property business and was a military police officer and probation officer. She also wrote novels and children's books.
In 2013 Branson published her autobiography, Mum's the Word: The High-Flying Adventures of Eve Branson.[9] Branson established the Eve Branson Foundation and served as its director.
Branson was a member of the board of directors of the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children ("ICMEC"), the goal of which is to help find missing children, and to stop the exploitation of children.[10] [11] She was a founding member of ICMEC's board of directors in 1999, seeking to generate awareness of the centre's work, and her son Richard was ICMEC's founding sponsor.[11] [12]
She married, in Frimley, Surrey, on 15 October 1949, Edward James "Ted" Branson, born on 10 March 1918, a former Cavalryman, son of Sir George Arthur Harwin Branson and wife Mona Joyce Bailey.[13] He died on 19 March 2011 in his sleep at the age of 93.[8]
In 2011, Branson escaped a fire at her son's Caribbean home on Necker Island.[14]
Branson died from COVID-19 complications on 8 January 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom at the age of 96.[15] [16] A celebration of her life was posted online by her son Richard.[17] He revealed that he owed his career to his mother, explaining that she had found a necklace in the 1960s and after the police let her keep the jewellery, because nobody had claimed it, she sold it and gave him the funds. "Without that £100, I could never have started Virgin," he said.[18]
The VMS Eve the carrier mothership for Virgin Galactic and launch platform for SpaceShipTwo-class Virgin SpaceShips (Tail number: N348MS[19]) was named in her honour by Virgin Galactic and her son Sir Richard Branson.[20]
A new Airbus A350-1000, G-VEVE - Fearless Lady has been named in her honour and was delivered to Virgin Atlantic in December 2021 as the first aircraft optimised for the airline's leisure routes.