NEW YORK TIMES, July 21, 2011--By now, Susannah Mushatt Jones knows her tastes are not changing.
She likes men, but not her ex-husband. She likes bacon and watermelon, though not necessarily together.
She likes Ronald Reagan — the actor, not that older guy who made speeches on television.
And she likes to think that somewhere out there in this big, sprawling city there is someone who has been around longer than she has.
Ms. Jones, who lives at the Vandalia Senior Center in Brooklyn, turned 112 this month. She is believed to be the oldest resident of New York State, according to the Gerontology Research Group.
“Who said that?” Ms. Jones demanded when told of the distinction, her mouth agape between smiles. “I can’t be.”
Born on July 6, 1899, in Lowndes County in Alabama, she was honored with a birthday party at the senior center on Tuesday. Though blind and hard of hearing, Ms. Jones, who uses a wheelchair, appeared to understand the meaning of the gathering.
Paul Taggart for The New York TimesA photograph of a younger Ms. Jones.
Wearing a red hat, a dark floral dress and white socks with black shoes, she thanked the other residents at the center and her family for attending. She nodded through most verses of “Happy Birthday,” a live version and a Stevie Wonder recording, and clutched her niece’s hand as tribute letters from the offices of the mayor and the governor were read aloud.
“I wish it could be like this all the time,” Ms. Jones said as the party concluded.
Ms. Jones moved to New York in 1923, in the early stages of the Harlem Renaissance, after graduating from the Calhoun School in Alabama. (At her graduation, on March 4, 1922, according to a program discovered by Ms. Jones’s niece, Lois Judge, last week, she gave a presentation on “Negro Music in France.”)
She married a man named Henry Jones in 1928, but divorced quickly and said she didn’t know what became of him. She has no children.
Ms. Jones worked mostly as a child caretaker for wealthy families before retiring in 1965. She also took in many of her own relatives who migrated to New York. Madge Price, whose mother was Ms. Jones’s first cousin, said she moved in with Ms. Jones on St. Nicholas Avenue when she was 17.
“She was like a mother to me,” Ms. Price said. “She packed my bag for my honeymoon.”
Like other oft-uttered superlatives — most likely to succeed, best burger in town, fastest car on the lot — the title of oldest living person in the state can be difficult to prove.
Paul Taggart for The New York TimesA proclamation given by the Brooklyn borough president to Ms. Jones in honor of her 112th birthday.
As of Tuesday, Ms. Jones ranked as one of 89 confirmed supercentenarians — people at least 110 years old — in the world, according to the Gerontology Research Group, which sifts through dozens of claims a year. Many prove false, or at least unconfirmed, said Dr. L. Stephen Coles, the group’s director.
The oldest person in history whose age had been confirmed, Jeanne Calment of France, died in 1997, at 122. Of the 89 confirmed supercentenarians today, 83 are women, including all but one of the 53 oldest. Ms. Jones is among 22 Americans, all female, to make the cut.
“We call it the female advantage,” Dr. Coles said. “We can’t really explain it scientifically, though we know it’s inherited.”
Gloria Cooke, 65, hopes it’s also contagious. She traveled Tuesday morning to Ms. Jones’s party from her c*ndominium across the street to “rub her for luck.”
Other attendees grumbled that the proceedings had delayed the start of lunch — a salmon platter that cost $1 for seniors and $2.50 for others. Some wondered where they could pick up their party favors: a visor, a bag and a pill box, provided by a health care company.
Many, though, approached Ms. Jones to embrace her after the party.
One relative asked how it felt to reach another birthday.
“You don’t feel now,” Ms. Jones said. “You’re just thankful.”
Posted By: Richard Kigel
Friday, July 22nd 2011 at 8:54AM
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