Sarah Leta Simpson

Sarah Leta Simpson, 69, of Athens, Georgia, passed away on December 26, 2022 at her home.

The youngest daughter of the late Robert Alexander and Marguerite G. Simpson, and sister of George, Sharon (Boardman), and Jackie (Booth), Sarah was born in Columbia, SC. She considered Griffin, Georgia her hometown and spent most of her life on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. Her greatest achievements were her magnificently beautiful, exceptionally talented, fiercely athletic, hauntingly gifted, kind, and wonderful daughters, Sarah Margaret Gretchen Pearce Legg Meacham and Evelyn Louise Legg Bull.

A long-time resident of Hilton Head Island, she partook in illustrious careers in banking, owning children’s clothing stores, short stints in Real Estate selling, and various other whims. She was a glass ceiling-shattering trailblazer, pausing only to birth her second legacy.

As the prototype for helicopter mothers, mama lions, and Queen Buttinskis, her time during her daughters’ youth was spent at PTA meetings, in the stands cheering tennis matches, in the seats at The Community Playhouse, Seahawk Booster Club, Island School Council, Heritage Food Booths, listening in on phone conversations, offering unsolicited advice, and inserting herself in places, situations, and decisions where she felt her opinion was necessary.

She lived her life according to her beloved back tattoo, “If you can’t be a good example, you’ll have to serve as a horrible warning.” Her dear and lifelong, long-suffering friends fondly and lovingly recall capers, stunts, ignored red flags, questionable advice, and general shenanigans. Bridget, Judy, Mary, Mari, Kelly, Mimzi, and countless others agree that the conversations had in her bedroom where she held court were among the emotionally deepest and most questionable times spent, and each universally exhaled with relief that none were captured and uploaded to the internet.

As a Southern Tiger Mama, her gorgeous daughters’ friends also benefited from her freely given advice. Playing dress up in her closet, going on road trips, and fetching items for her current whims and desires are core memories that the finest therapists can’t unravel. Their accomplishments were her own. Bridesmaids Luncheons, Birthday Parties, Bar Mitzvahs, Baby Showers, and Random Celebrations of Tuesdays would make the finest hostesses hang their heads in shame. Attending a Sarah Event meant that anything was possible. She loved a theme, she loved a costume, she loved a party and she voraciously devoured attention. Sarah was fun.

Her grandchildren, the light in her eyes: Harper, Ike, Sadie, James Meacham & Drake, and Dewey Bull were showered with age-inappropriate gifts, given unsafe toys, books about bodily functions, and regaled with untrue, and content-questionable, mostly untrue fables of their mothers’ youths.

She and her family were extremely proud that Sarah attended and graduated Magna Cum Laude from The University of South Carolina at Beaufort in 2012 and received a master’s degree in Social Work in 2016, again graduating with the highest honors.

She lived her life loving the biggest, laughing the loudest, burning bridges, cheering the proudest, digging in her yard, hot gluing projects, fighting against imaginary injustices, reading trashy novels, and causing general mayhem wherever she went. It was once said that no one can mess up a kitchen like Sarah Leta. She will not be soon forgotten, she was truly and thankfully, one of a kind.

In addition to flowers, one may want to consider selling any stock held in Diet Coke, or Winston Cigarettes, both of whom have experienced a noticeable dip in revenue since her passing.

A memorial service will be held on Saturday, January 28 at St. Luke’s Anglican Church, 50 Pope Avenue, in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina at 4:00 p.m. with the Rev. Dr. Jady Koch officiating.