PORTLAND – Blandine A. Gain, 102, passed away comfortably and peacefully on Monday, Nov. 18, 2019 at 75 State Street, following a recent illness.

She was the daughter of Eloi and Euphemie (Hebert) Lagassey, born in St. Agatha, Maine, on May 9, 1917, at the family farm, and was a 1934 graduate of Wisdom High School.

Following graduation, she moved to Westbrook to live with her eldest sister, Elvine Caron, and her family, to help with caring for her niece, Claudette, and young twins, Peter and Paul. A job as a nanny in Portland followed and allowed her to save enough to enroll in cosmetology school, which in the 1930s amazingly cost a $75 tuition!

As a hairstylist, Blandine went on to manage beauty shops both in Portland and Laconia, N.H., eventually running her own home-based shop well into her 80s.

Blandine married John “Jack” Gain on Oct. 19, 1946, at Sacred Heart Church, Portland.

Jack always claimed she had “picked him up” though in reality they had been neighbors on Park Avenue and met casually when Blandine stopped to say “hello” to a handsome young man sitting on his front steps who looked lonesome. Of course, that was Jack and the rest became not only “his” story, but “her” story as well.

Blandine and Jack lived on Dennett Street together for 31 years, Jack passing in June 1988. Blandine then maintained her home till 2005 when she joined her daughter, Jaclyn Gilbert and family in Westbrook at their address.

Blandine was a devoted wife, mother, grandmother and great grandmother. A volunteer at McAuley High School, her daughters’ alma mater, and a volunteer for the Good Cause Shop run by the Sisters of Mercy. She had a solid devotion to her faith, recited her rosary daily without fail and was a communicant of St Joseph’s Church in Portland and later St. Anthony’s Church after her relocation to Westbrook.

Blandine was predeceased by her husband of 41 years, John “Jack” H. Gain, her daughter, Sylvia Gain Sandora, granddaughter, Belinda Sandora Taylor and her five brothers and five sisters.

She is survived by her daughters, Janine Gain Spindler, husband, William F. Spindler of Portland; Jaclyn Gain Gilbert, husband, Arthur P. Gilbert of Westbrook. Granddaughters, Chelsey Gilbert Welling, husband, Kurt Welling of Marshfield, Massachusetts: Molly Spindler Smith, husband, Adam R. Smith of Fort Myers, Florida: and Joanna Gilbert Callahan, husband Corey Callahan of Middletown, Delaware. Grandsons, Gregory Sandora of Florida, Joseph Sandora of South Portland, John Sandora of Portland, their spouses and families, great-grandchildren, Saegan and Ellison Welling, Ceira, Jackson, Blakely, and Weston Callahan and many nieces and nephews.

Family and friends are invited to attend a time of visitation on Saturday, November 23, 2019 from 9-10:30 a.m., at A.T. Hutchins Funeral Home, 660 Brighton Avenue, Portland, followed by a Mass of Christian Burial at 11 a.m., at the chapel of the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, 307 Congress St., Portland. Interment will follow the Mass at New Calvary Cemetery in South Portland.

Please visit http://www.athutchins.com to view Blandine’s tribute page and to sign her online guestbook.

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