Norfolk City Virginia USGenWeb Archives Obituaries.....Wilson, Lula Ann September 9, 2006
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/vafiles.htm
************************************************

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Robert Woolfitt http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00034.html#0008401 May 21, 2022, 4:08 pm

Virginian-Pilot  September 24, 2006
CHESAPEAKE - If Lula Wilson was cooking, you were in for a good meal.

Whether she was feeding her family and friends or visitors at the St. Mary's 
Basilica soup kitchen, she made sure no one went wanting.

Wilson, known as "Lou Lou," died Sept. 9 at age 74.

She was the soup kitchen's first manager when it started more than 20 years ago 
and helped it more than live up to its name.

Anna Marie Cross knew Wilson for more than 30 years. They worked together in the 
soup kitchen.

Cross said the kitchen fed more than 2,000 people a week during its busiest 
periods, serving hot meals five days a week.

"She had certain standards," Cross said. "People would never go through a line, 
they would sit and be served, and it wasn't going to be sandwiches; it was a hot 
meal."

The Rev. Thomas J. Quinlan launched the effort, with Wilson by his side.

"She ran it like a high-class restaurant," Quinlan said. "She had a tremendous 
sense of service to the poor."

"Every day, she was always there," Cross said. "She was true to her beliefs, and 
there was no gain, no recognition for her. She had a backbone. She had a moral 
sense of what was right and just did it."

The women remained friends until Wilson's death.

"She was such a giving person," Cross said. "This was a real loss."

It wasn't all work with Wilson. She was funny and liked to dance. "She was a fun 
person," Cross said.

She was fun at home, too, her children said, but they knew better than to act up.

Wilson was born in Norfolk and graduated from Booker T. Washington High School. 
She married James A. Wilson Sr., a merchant seaman who spent months at sea.

She raised five children in the Chesapeake Manor area of the city.

"Everybody was just family there," said Shelia Wilder, Wilson's daughter. 
"Anything she could do for whoever, she did."

Everyone who knew Wilson said she could make friends with anyone, from the nicest 
neighborhoods in town to the ghetto, mainly because she never changed who she was.

"It didn't matter what you were or who you were, she was the same all the time," 
Wilder said.

File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/va/norfolkcity/obits/w/wilson3020nob.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.net/vafiles/

File size: 2.7 Kb