A woman dubbed a real-life ‘Lady’ after marrying her own ‘Tramp’, whom she found going through her bins, has sadly died.

Joan Neininger and Ken Selway, from Gloucestershire, originally met in 1975 when she saw him from her bookshop window, scavenging for scraps from a nearby chippy.

Their love blossomed and in 2016, during the leap year, Neininger proposed to her, before the couple tied the knot in 2017.

Tragically, Ken passed away in 2019, at the age of 92.

And now Joan – the other half of ‘Lady and the Tramp’ – has also died at the age of 94.

Joan Neininger, who was dubbed a real-life ‘Lady’ after marrying her own ‘Tramp’, Ken Selway, whom she found going through her bins, has sadly died.

The couple, who married in 2017, had met some 40 years earlier when she saw him looking through the trash outside her bookstore. Ken Selway and Joan Neininger photographed at their residential home in Gloucester (right)

Her daughter Joy Walters said: ‘She accomplished a lot in her 94 years.

“She really was a remarkable and unique woman. There are no two ways to do it..’

Joan and Ken became friends after their chance meeting in the late 1970s.

At that time, he was sleeping outdoors at stations and in the doors of shops.

But she noted that he was different from other homeless people, neatly dressed in a belted gray trench coat and drinking only milk.

She assumed he was staying at a B&B and simply had nowhere to go during the day, but she soon realized he was homeless.

After reading Jeremy Sandford’s Down and Out in Britain, she realized that Ken might be one of many ordinary people escaping the safety net of the welfare state.

Joan then sought advice from the local church minister, her family and her daughter, who suggested leaving the sandwiches in the bin as they would not accept money.

The garbage collectors took the first package, but Joan did more and finally, with the blessing of her husband Norman, to whom she was married for 30 years, she invited Ken to dinner.

Joan later found out that Londoner Ken had nowhere to go because he was an evacuee.

And it is that, after the death of the man of the house, his mother could not cope with his mental health problems.

Ken was evacuated to Wales, where he became a Bevin Boy, and was on a mission to find relatives when he ended up sleeping in an abandoned house near the bookstore.

A photo that Ken Selway used to carry in his pocket when he was homeless. The photo is of Ken when he lived in London when he was young.

Norman, Joan’s first husband (left) with Joan Neininger and Ken Selway at The Cannon pub in Gloucester

Where Ken used to eat out of the bins when he was homeless in Gloucester, Gloucestershire (pictured)

For a long time he refused all offers of help and money, telling him: ‘You will get in trouble.’

But his father finally convinced Ken that it was the whole family that was concerned about his well-being.

Joan eventually left her husband to live in a trailer with Ken, who suffered from schizophrenia.

Although Norman also tried to help Ken, he struggled with his schizophrenia and for a while put a strain on his marriage.

Ken frequently considered suicide, but for three decades Joan saved him from himself.

She persuaded Ken to take medication for his mental health problems and eventually the three of them lived happily together in a cabin that Joan described as “like a little paradise”.

She says the men were like brothers until Norman died of a heart attack in 1983, leaving Ken and Joan at the cabin until he needed extra care and was moved to assisted living.

He then proposed to her in 2016, and the marriage followed at a register office in Cinderford on her 89th birthday in February 2017, four days after Valentine’s Day.

Joy, a retired administrative worker from Gloucester, said: ‘At the time, it divided the family a bit.

‘Because she wanted Ken to move in with her and my dad because with Ken, he was always like a kid.

Joan proposed to her in 2016, and the marriage followed at a register office in Cinderford in February 2017, her 89th birthday, four days after Valentine’s Day.

The couple lived in the cabin until he required additional care and was transferred to assisted living.

Joan’s daughter, Joy, said the couple had a kind of “real” friendship that formed the basis of their wedding.

“It wasn’t so much a romance as a true platonic friendship.

I always chalked it up to her losing her son Robert, my brother, at the age of nine to cancer.

“It was just that she had to, if you want, save Ken and that divided the family at the time.”

“But finally, after many years, she ended up in a country house and my father lived there with her and Ken.

“Everything was resolved eventually, but then my dad had a second heart attack and passed away.”

Joan was heartbroken by Ken’s death four years ago.

She moved into The Knoll nursing home in Gloucester in October 2020 and passed away peacefully there last week from dementia and old-age frailty after her condition deteriorated significantly during the Covid-19 lockdowns, her family said. .

Joan will receive a Buddhist farewell after converting to the faith as an adult.

Joan was heartbroken by Ken’s death four years ago. She moved into The Knoll Nursing Home in Gloucester in October 2020 and passed away peacefully there last week due to dementia.

Joy said: ‘His death certificate said dementia and frailty in old age.

“She developed dementia while Ken was alive, but once she died, it got worse and worse during the pandemic because we weren’t allowed to visit her.

“She went downhill quickly during the pandemic because we couldn’t go visit her.

‘The house did what it could but we couldn’t visit it.

“Eventually we were able to and they had a pod with a screen that we could use to visit her, but she could never figure out why we couldn’t touch and hold her.”

It was very cruel.

“She was always an activist for the homeless and against animal cruelty.

She was a practicing Buddhist. She strove to find something her entire life and she had an enormous thirst for knowledge.

His funeral will take place at 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday June 21 at Gloucester Crematorium.

The family has asked that donations be made to Gloucester Feed the Hungry and Greyhound Rescue in lieu of flowers.

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Source: tit.edu.vn