A grandmother who revealed on her death bed her favourite colour was yellow was given a send off – in an ‘Only Fools And Horses’ three-wheeled van.
Ethel Westover’s family arranged for a “lovely jubbly” funeral in a classic Del Boy Reliant Robin.
The 98-year-old’s funeral cortege did a lap along a promenade – with the van pulling Ethel’s coffin.
Ethel’s nephew Mick Dennison, 58, said: “Auntie Ethel sprang it on us when she told us on her death bed that her favourite colour was yellow – we didn’t even know that.
“And then she said she wanted a yellow hearse. I’m sure she did it on purpose to have a final laugh at us.”
But Ethel’s son Stephen, who lives in Wales, could not find a yellow hearse for love nor money.
Bizarrely, what he did happen upon was an Only Fools and Horses themed one, from company Only Fools and Hearses.
Pub landlord Mick, from the seaside town of Morcambe, Lancs., said: “Stephen started thinking it was a great idea and put it to Ethel’s sister – who said go for it.
“The funny thing is we don’t even know if Ethel was a fan of Only Fools and Horses. We just know she was a funny woman and liked a laugh.
“She would have loved it. She had a wicked sense of humour.
“It was a wonderful funeral with lots of laughs and memories.”
Mick told how the hearse even got stopped by the police on the A6 on the way to the funeral home.
Ethel, from Lancster, Lancs., was a dinner lady at the local school for many years.
The novelty funeral car hire company says it aims to “offer a family a totally unique Del Boy send-off, as we know the Trotters have made us cry with laughter for over 30 years”.
Ethel has a son and a daughter, Stephen and Karen, and was married to Len, who was in the SAS during the Second World War when Ethel was in the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes (NAAFI).
Mick said: “We heard how Ethel threw rock cake at Len the first time she met him, working at the NAAFI, because he annoyed her.”
Her funeral was at Lancaster and Morecambe Crematorium on Monday followed by funeral tea at Mick’s pub, The York Hotel.
