Brenda C. Bleakney, 85

CENTER HARBOR — Brenda Cordis Bleakney, 85, passed away at her home on Sept. 26, 2025.

She was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on Sept. 3, 1940, the daughter of Dr. Charles J. and Molly (Mary T. Looney) Callahan. Brenda (the family called her Rusty) was the oldest. She helped care for and raise her siblings due to Molly being a nurse at Boston Hospital and incessant illness. Her siblings include Charles "Cal" Callahan, Lynne (Callahan) Cavanaugh, and the twins, Barbara Callahan and (deceased) Barry Callahan. She grew up in various cities in Massachusetts, Jamaica Plains, Cohasset and Wellesley.

As a Catholic, she attended various Catholic schools including Ursline Academy where she furthered her education to become a dental hygienist. Regrettably, graduation night had an incident which severed her fingers forcing her to choose a different career path. Boston Children’s Hospital then to Sheraton Boston as the hostess, where she would meet her future husband Richard "Dick" A. Bleakney (now deceased), a widowed father of four children, and a lifelong career man at Boston Gas Co.

The hospitality business would become her career of choice, which would carry her into New Hampshire with her new family, which would lead her into being a home health care provider.

Helping people was her life legacy, always giving of herself when at times she had nothing to give but herself and time.

She and Dick married April 16, 1967 (after she converted to Protestant), forming her family Paul "Skip" Bleakney (deceased at 18), who was just shipping out for Vietnam, Richard R. "Rick" Bleakney (9), Christopher "Dale" Bleakney (8) and Joy Christine (Bleakney) Weirwille (7), who had all lost their mother to cancer. She had the soul of a caregiver, and this was her wonderful life, living in Wellesley Hills on Standish Circle. Her career was now to become a full-time mother and build her family, giving birth to their daughter, Kimberly A. (Bleakney) Cook in 1968.

The challenges of raising children who had lived in "nanny hell" (as they call it) was a challenge she accepted with love, hugs by the bushel, stability and determination. Rick would come marching home looking like Huckleberry Finn with a group of neighborhood kids with his daily catch from Longfellow Pond; Dale collected snakes and left them various places; Joy was emotional with horrible skin and teeth, all stress from the life before Brenda; and she set out to fix it all. Oh, she was not perfect. She had moments when she said, “What am I doing here?” But she was resilient, carrying her first born and completing the family. She took on all life challenges with determination and grace.

In 1976, they moved to Tamworth, to the summer home on Pease Hill Road. It was not the lifestyle Brenda was familiar with at all, leaving the hustle and bustle of city living her whole adult life. She made Tamworth her village. She formed many lifelong friends, but to note one, it would be Barbara Walker and her family. She loved “her” Barbie, and her family.

At that time, Rick was attending the University of Maine and would then move back to Tamworth, where he would build his family on Brown Hill Road, residing now in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Dale was attending Wichita University in Kansas, where he would reside, build a career in flight and raise his family. Joy graduated from Kennett High School, furthering her education at the University of New Hampshire, eventually her love for life would lead her out west to build her family. Kim began at K.A. Brett School in Tamworth, on to Kennett, residing in Center Harbor, where she would build her family.

Eventually Brenda moved in with Kim in Center Harbor, residing with her family for the remaining years of her life. In Center Harbor, Brenda found the love of family to live out her remaining life, with son-in-law Bill Cook, Kim and their family, Evan Bleakney and his wife Jenn (Blackey) Bleakney, their children Hazel and Kolt, Mya (Bleakney) St. Jacques and her husband Chad St. Jacques, Madison Cook and the rest of Bill and Kim’s extended family.

She loved to be involved and spend time with her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Her husband’s lifelong dream was to own an airport, so they purchased Moultonborough Airport in 1978, and attempted as a team to put it on the map, paving, building, providing services and for a few years having huge airshows to benefit Easterseals. Both worked other jobs to support it during the recession in the early 1980s. It would fall victim to the economy, but it never beat them, they rebuilt.

Aside from being a mother, wife and caregiver, Brenda’s true love was being a grandmother. She loved spending time with all of her grandkids, and great-grandkids. She truly coined the phrase “You don’t need to be blood to be family.” She embraced every one of her children’s childhood friends as family, and then their children as her grandchildren. Her heart was so big she had to give love away or it would truly burst. She worked her whole life up until recent years, taking care of others, even when they didn’t need it. It was her true passion.

Any service will be a small gathering at Chocorua Lake and the date for the celebration of life will be announced at a later date. For more information, go to Dupuisfuneralhome.com.