Obituary of Olga T. Jeffreys

Olga T., (age 91) of Malvern, Pa., was welcomed into heaven on February 13, 2017. Beloved wife of the late E. Warren Jeffreys, daughter of the late Frank and Mary Kontrye, Olga was the last remaining of their seven children. Olga was born in Malvern and spent all her life in Chester County. She was a member of St. Patrick's Church in Malvern for more than 80 years, often attending daily Mass. Olga was forced to quit school at age 17 to help the family survive the Great Depression, starting on a lifetime of more than 70 years of various forms of work. She worked for several decades at Vishay Technology in Malvern as a technician. Olga's husband died suddenly of a heart attack in 1974, and to pay off the mortgage she was very unexpectedly left with, Olga started working weekends doing what she knew and loved best: spending time with children as a babysitter and cleaning houses. She loved both. Olga, who was known by her family as "Aunt Giggi," short for Giggling and her husband, known as Jeff, had one daughter, Kimberly Ann. Olga's proudest moment came when Kim graduated from the University of Pittsburgh. In retirement, Olga continued babysitting and cleaning houses, remarking in her 80s that no one cleaned under couches anymore, as she would tell her daughter how she would lift a couch with one arm so she could push the vacuum cleaner under the lifted couch with the other. She would eventually become so beloved by the families she worked for that she became part of their families, and would be invited to their dinner parties, their weddings, even their vacations. Kim married Timothy Carroll in 1990 and the births of their three sons—Matthew Charles, Brian Jeffreys, and Stephen Timothy—were Olga's happiest moments. A perfect day for her was to take one or all of her grandsons to the Paoli hardware store to buy toys, ride the train into Philadelphia just so they could ride the next one back, and stop off somewhere for a hamburger or a slice of Malvern Pizza. Olga lived to age 90 on her own, often walking the more than half mile to church at St. Pat's. Even as she moved to the Brunswick assisted-living memory facility at Attleboro in Langhorne in the last year, she never stopped smiling at the wonderful staff and when family and friends came to visit. Family and friends are invited to attend her Mass of Christian Burial on Saturday, February 18th at 11 AM at St. John the Evangelist Church, 752 Big Oak Road, Morrisville, PA. Friends and family may call at the church from 9:30 to just before Mass. In lieu of flowers, please consider a contribution to Catholic Charities, which can be reached at 215-587-5650 or by mail at 100 North 20th Street, Suite 301, Philadelphia PA 19103. The website is CatholicCharitiesAppeal.org. Please designate any contribution in Olga's memory to the Schools of Special Education.