VETERAN York fundraiser Joyce Gee has finally hung up her boots - after raising more than £1 million to help children with physical and mental difficulties over 47 years.

Joyce launched the Deanne Gee Memorial Fund in 1980 after her daughter Deanne died, aged just 14, from spinal muscle atrophy. But by then she and Deanne had already been fundraising for seven years.

Deanne went to Northfield school. “She came home one day and said ‘they need some equipment for the cookery room. Would you be able to have a raffle?’” said Joyce, who lives in Kingsway North.

After Deanne died, Joyce continued her fundraising. Deanne’s paediatrician, Dr Hugh Heggarty, said ‘Hey, Joyce, we’ve got a little girl who needs a wheelchair!’ The Deanne Gee Memorial Fund was born.

Ever since, with the help of a small army of volunteers, Joyce has been raising money through table top sales, jumble sales and fancy dress parades. The total raised long ago passed £1 million. Joyce has twice been invited to Buckingham Palace - in 2001 and 2016 - and in 2015 she was awarded the BEM.

On her first visit to the Palace she went with a friend. “And I remember saying ‘Ee, Mary, did you ever think two lasses from a York council estate would be sitting here?’” she said.

Over the years, the memorial fund has bought equipment - including wheelchairs, electronic typewriters and speech training equipment - for countless children. Joyce also supported The Press’s 2008 Guardian Angels appeal, which raised £300,000 for a children’s unit at York Hospital. She went to the opening - and was was amazed to find it was on ward 17, where Deanne always stayed.

But Joyce is now 74. “I’ve had a bad back for a while, and many of my volunteers are getting older!” she said. She wound the charity up at the end of last year. “But it has been a wonderful journey. I have met so many wonderful people!”