Bemerton Estate loses its ‘fearless, robust voice’ – Gloria Johnson

Published: 5th November, 2010
by PETER GRUNER

TRIBUTES were paid this week to a “fearless” champion of tenants on her estate who has been found dead at her home on the top floor of a tower block. 

Police found the body of Gloria Johnson, 72, who lived on her own, on the ninth floor of Perth House on the Bemerton estate in Islington after she was reported missing by friends and neighbours. It is believed she had been dead for at least a week. 

Tania Smith, 39, a neighbour, said: “She was a very nice lady but very private. You often wouldn’t see her for days on end. No  one suspected  anything was wrong. We think she suffered a heart attack.”  

Last January, the Tribune reported how Ms Johnson was “maroon­ed” for three days with other residents on the top floor of the block after lifts broke down. 

Finally, she was forced to walk down nine flights of stairs to do her shopping. Climbing up the stairs again with two shopping bags took 25 minutes, “stopping for a breather” at each floor.

A former railway worker at King’s Cross, she was rehoused on the estate after it was built in the mid-1970s.

With her trademark beehive hair she was a familiar figure in the area and was described as utterly committed to her estate and to a way of life she felt had withered away – where people showed each other respect and behaved with courtesy.

She had lived through the Bemerton estate’s rougher moments about a decade ago and was appalled at the way prostitutes, drug dealers and other criminals tried to move in.

King’s Cross campaigner William Perrin said: “Gloria was a fearless, robust voice in local civic society speaking up for tenants of social housing, older people and indeed anything that occurred to her. She will be sorely missed.

“Often walking down the Cally Road I would be hailed at high volume by Gloria, often from the launderette, to talk through her latest issues.

“She had a keen eye for things that were broken and needed fixing and absolutely no hesitation in spelling them out in words of one syllable with Anglo Saxon invective.”

Ms Johnson remained exceptionally vigilant when it came to anti-social behaviour and to any incidents of vice-related activity in the neighbourhood.

Labour councillor Paul Convery said: “I used to see her almost every day and she would always have something to say or ask about.

“She had a burning sense about what was right and what wasn’t. And she always knew what went on around her. Sometimes she interpreted events wrongly but often she was absolutely spot-on.

“I’ve chaired scores of neighbourhood meetings in the last five years or so and you could be sure that Gloria would also attend. 

“She could be quite hard work when she got her mind fixed on something. And that something wasn’t always the subject under discussion. 

“But she was a sincere, determined and committed woman with very firm opinions.”