COWEN, Roselyn Gay

COWEN, Roselyn Gay

03 May 1937

06 Oct 2026

Roselyn Gay Cowen (born Coates) was born in Lithgow, NSW. Her rugby hero father John Stanley Coates died when she was almost two, leaving her mother Gwladys Dorothy (born Roberts) to raise her and eventually Gay’s two younger brothers with Gwladys’s second husband John Dryburgh. At 17, Gay started training as a nurse, winning the Maitland Hospital nursing gold medal in 1958 and going on to study midwifery at Crown Street Women’s Hospital in Sydney. Gay met Ian Walter Cowen in primary school and married him in 1959. After her second child was born, she gave up nursing as a profession – but never as a calling. Gay raised Jo-Anne (spouse Helen), Alyson (Jonathon) and Stuart and later helped raise grandsons Joshua and Jordan Hourigan and Ashley Cowen. When the family moved from Lithgow to Canberra in 1967, Gay helped manage the family news agencies in Garran and Civic and coached girls’ hockey. After relocating to Surfers Paradise in 1988, she and Ian managed a holiday highrise. They retired on the Gold Coast, where Gay was active in Rotary’s Inner Wheel Club and volunteered at the Gold Coast Hospital. The birth of her great-granddaughter Rudi Cowen brought her great joy in the final year of her life.

Gay was predeceased by her beloved younger brother Dr. Laurence George Dryburgh in 2019 and by Ian in 2022. She is survived by her brother Phillip Dryburgh.

Her memorial service will be held Friday Oct. 30 at 1 p.m. at A Gentle Touch Funerals, 73 Railway St., Mudgeeraba, Qld, with a reception to follow nearby at The Village, 65 Railway St. Contact the family for the livestream link. In lieu of flowers, a donation to Lifeline would be appreciated.