NEWS: 100th Birthday, Cherry, Mrs. Kate - Jefferson Co

KATE CHERRY CHALKS UP A CENTURY

Smoke from the pipe she puffs wraps Mrs. Kate Cherry in a haze. What
she's thinking about is her secret.  "She's only this way with strangers,"
says Mrs. Mayme Robinson, operator of the nursing home. "She visits
everybody in every other room every day.  She keeps asking for work.
Sometimes we let her wipe off the tables.  At the rate she's going she'll
live to be 105.  "Grandma" Cherry picks that up quickly.

"Another 100?  Heavens, no, I don't want that!"  Grandma, you see,
will reach her first 100 on Tuesday.  Her daughter, Mrs. Ella Steinmetz,
76, of 513 Baxter, has already ordered a cake.  It will have two tiers
and one candle for one century.

"Don't want no fuss," says Grandma.  "Just want my pipe. "How long
have I smoked it?  Why, all my life.  Went to a baseball game once with
my grandson.  That day I smoked a whole pack of cigarettes."

Says Mrs. Steinmetz:  "Mama's just changed in the past two months.
Only six weeks ago she did the twist one night when we had company.
"She was living with my sister, Mrs. Nettie Burns.  They'd lived
together a long time.  Then Nettie died last month and Mama seemed to
lose her gumption.

"Two years ago when she was 98 she decided to put a new chimney on
her house (6667 Sylvania).  "She climbed up on a ladder and took down
what was left of the old chimney.  Then she climbed up with one of those
things full of cement that bricklayers use and she fell off.

"My sister came running out in the yard and she said, "Mama, you
really have killed yourself this time.  She called the police and when
they got there one of them knew her and he asked her what she was doing.

"What does it look like I'm doing?" Mama said. `Can't you see I'm
just lying here?'"  "Anyway they took her to the hospital, and, do you
know, she didn't even have one bruise?  She went home and finished that
chimney."  Grandma says, "That's right, all I've ever done is work.  I
baked bread for people.  And I did their washing.  And I quilted.  That's
what I like....making quilts from little pieces."

Grandma tells you other things that her daughter verifies. "I was
born at the old City Hospital.  My mother did the washing there.  "And I
went to school, but only for one grade.  Because I used to run off. We
lived down by the Point, and we were always moving when the river came up."

Grandma's name then was Kate Ott.  She married Fred Wilbanks and
had four children.  Mrs. Steinmetz is the only one living.  After
Wilbanks died she married William Cherry.

Living in Louisville right now are Kate's 18 grandchildren, 200
great-grandchildren, and 29 great-great grandchildren.

Since her birthday party is to be at noon, none of them will attend.
"They're all working," says Mrs. Steinmetz.  Besides, Grandma has made
it clear to everybody, She "don't want no fuss."

The Courier Journal, Louisville, Kentucky, August 25, 1963
>From the Scrapbook of Irene Wiley Judge
Beulah Wiley Franks wrfc71a@prodigy.com

Submitted by: MRS BEULAH A FRANKS
WRFC71A@prodigy.com 
Date: Tue,  2 Sep 1997