Jane Agnes Tomlinson (nee O'Dea)

Jane Agnes Tomlinson (nee O’Dea)

February 5, 1956 to October 16, 2025

Those of us lucky enough to know Jane Tomlinson knew how her sweetness, kindness and cheerfulness enhanced our lives. It was evident to her family, her friends and in her choice of careers.

She was a free-spirited blond endearing imp as a child.

When Jane moved to Government House as a young girl she charmed everyone from the staff to visiting dignitaries. She loved having the run of that place for a couple of years while her siblings were at boarding school, and then when she eventually went to England for high school, became the teachers’ pet and enchanted all there.

Jane ended up in England again when she left Newfoundland in her early twenties with a British husband and small child.

There she stayed for nearly fifty years, adding more children along the way. There was nothing Jane loved better then assembling her family for a great roast dinner. Her Yorkshire puddings were legendary.

Jane’s compulsion to help people steered her into careers as a nanny, an occupational therapist assistant and a social worker. Her coworkers and even her clients became friends who trusted her implicitly because of her open nature and genuine interest in their problems.

Tragically the time between her cancer diagnosis and her death was less than a month. Minutes after she was told her prognosis in hospital and prescribed palliative care, she cheerfully told her family that she was the only one in that hospital room who was not afraid of her dying.

Missing her every day are her children David, Luke, Amy (Krista) and Matthew; her sister Viki O’Dea and brother Stephen O’Dea; her cousin and special friend Kate Chalker.

Those of her family who predeceased her are her father the Hon. Fabian O’Dea, her mother Peggy O’Dea and her sister Deborah O’Dea. Her partner Paul Harvey died a few months after Jane. Her funeral has taken place in England and a Celebration of Life is planned for St. John’s.