I wanted to take this opportunity to wish a happy 100th birthday to my grandmother, Nora Edna Wilson. I just finished talking to her a few minutes ago and she sounds great. She is looking forward to her birthday celebration at the church in a few hours, when she will be joined by her one surviving son, her grandchildren, her great- grandchildren, and her great-great-grandchildren.

Edna was born in 1906 in Dysartsville, NC, literally in a log cabin. The picture to the right shows her parents with three of their children. Edna is the one on the far left. She grew up without running water or indoor plumbing. When she was fourteen years old, her family loaded everything they had in a cart and moved about 35 miles to Spindale. She took a job as a spinner in the local textile mill, a job she held until she got married at age 23 to Abraham Lincoln Wilson, a.k.a. “Red.”

They moved to Knoxville, TN, where Red took a job as a weaver. Their first son, Eugene, was born there. The picture to the left shows Red, Edna, and Gene. They moved back to Spindale when the plant closed. They lived with Edna’s parents until Boyce was born.They moved to Cramerton, NC, when Boyce was about five months old. They lived there ten years, with Red working in a mill, first as a weaver and then as a loom fixer. Edna also worked in the mill, combing out bad places in the cloth. Because she was the best woman working there, she was asked to do a man’s job when World War II started, but she refused because Red was tired of working third shift and wanted to find a new job. They moved to Shelby, NC, to work in another mill. My father Keith was born while they lived in Shelby.

When Keith was nine months old, they moved to Spindale on Ohio Street, the home she would live in until she was 99 years old. They bought the house and land for $1,200. For a while, Red still worked in Shelby, but of course they had trouble getting gas since this was during World War II. He then got a job at Stonecutter Mill as a loom fixer. The picture to the right shows my father Keith with Edna and Red during this period. Edna did not work from this point until after Red died, when she got a job in the cafeteria at Spindale Elementary School, a job she kept until she was 68 (mandatory retirement was 65, but they did not catch it at the time, so she kept working). Red died of a heart attack at age 52, which means Edna lived longer after he died that she did while they were married.

Edna has been the matriarch of the family since her father died at age 99. Edna was the second oldest of twelve children and the oldest girl. Two of her sisters died before they were two and one died at the age of four. The picture to the left shows her father (second from the left in the front) with his nine adult children. Edna is in the blue dress on the right. Only four of her siblings are still living. She has also outlived two of her sons. My father died in 1997 (in the same room as his father). Gene died a year and a half ago.

She has lived through World War I, World War II (in which her husband served), the Korean War (in which her sons Gene and Boyce served), the Vietnam War (in which her son Keith [my father] served), and both Iraq Wars. When she was born, New Mexico, Arizona, Alaska, and Hawaii were not states. She has seen the invention of the television, the computer, and the Internet, while television, cars, and airplanes became widespread during her life. She has lived through the Great Depression (the year she got married), the first space flight, the moon landings, and exploratory space craft being sent to Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. She has seen five generations of her offspring, including my children, seen with her in the picture above.

Although Edna had to move into an assisted living facility earlier this year, she is still going strong. Her hearing is not what it once was, but her memory is still good and he mind is still fairly sharp. Somehow, I think she will bury the rest of us. I hope all of you will join me in wishing her a happy 100th!

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