Pillar of the community, Aurora James, known to friends and family as Irma, died on March 31. Mrs James, who had lived on the Blackbird Leys estate for 55 years, was well-known in the community for her charity work. She began volunteering for the Sailors’ Society in 1988 after her late husband Eli James encouraged her to become a fundraiser. She said back in 2018, when she was celebrating 30 years of volunteering for the charity: “I knew nothing about Sailors’ Society - Eli gave me the push to do it. “Old age is getting the better of me but for them, and for my husband, I will go the extra mile. It is a permanent memorial to him.”