My friend Lorry Leader, who has died from lung cancer aged 67, was an administrator at the Guardian for nearly 20 years. She was a much-loved colleague and sympathetic ally to countless reporters and editors.
She was born Sarah Loretta Leader in St Pancras, north London, to Samuel Leader, a teacher, who had arrived in the UK in 1913 from Poland, and his wife, Bertha (nee Schwarz), who came to Britain from Vienna after the Anschluss in 1938.
Lorry, as she was known, grew up in Stamford Hill, Hackney, and went to school at JFS, a Jewish mixed comprehensive. After finishing her A-levels in 1972, she became a Braille corrector in the book production department of the National Library for the Blind. Four years later she became an adventure playworker in Notting Hill and then Peckham before in 1979 enrolling as a student nurse at University College Hospital. After a year, she changed to the humanities and went on to achieve a first in English literature from Middlesex Polytechnic (now Middlesex University).
In 1984 Lorry became assistant to the director/editor at the Writers and Scholars Educational Trust and Index on Censorship, campaigning organisations for freedom of expression, where she stayed for 10 years. In this role she patiently mentored volunteers who compiled the important “Index Index” section of Index on Censorship – a country-by-country factual listing of abuses of freedom of expression that was put together each issue.
Her colleague Philip Spender remembers her as “laughing, intelligent, efficient, and thorough – a stout defender of her opinions – she knew why she held them and was happy to argue her case lightly but firmly.”
In 1993 she met Giorgio Giandomenici, who would become her partner for the next 28 years. They married in 2011. Their shared love of travelling took them to Paris, to his native Venice and beyond. She particularly loved the forest of columns in the mosque in Cordoba, the synagogue of El Tránsito in Toledo and the Blue mosque in Istanbul.
Lorry joined the Guardian newsdesk as an administrator in 1996 and, as the Guardian’s editor-in-chief, Katharine Viner, said: “Lorry supported countless news editors, was a confidant and friend to reporters and specialists. Lorry’s unflappable and generous nature were essential to the newsroom through many testing times.”
Lorry was a staunch, but critical, Labour supporter. She also loved the theatre, books, art and music. After leaving the Guardian in 2016, she took a variety of online courses, including one about Shakespeare, a passion of hers – she knew most of Macbeth and Hamlet by heart. She also had an old piano tuned and had started to revive her playing skills. A few days before her death she sang a word-perfect rendition of Tonight from West Side Story.
Lorry was devoted to her many friends: kind, thoughtful, funny and passionate about helping others.
She is survived by her husband and a nephew.
