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 established the Eve Branson Foundation and served as its director.[5]
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]
Personal life and death
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]
Legacy
The VMS Eve the carrier mothership for Virgin Galactic and launch platform for SpaceShipTwo-based 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 will be delivered to Virgin Atlantic in December 2021 as the first aircraft optimised for the airline's leisure routes.[citation needed]
