A super-centenarian who celebrated her 111th birthday with two parties attributes her long life to drinking a tot of WHISKY every night.
Grace Jones was born at the end of the Edwardian era, in 1906, the year the first teddy bear was manufactured.
Nicknamed ‘Amazing Grace’ by her family and friends, she is two years younger than the oldest woman in Britain, and believed to be the sixth oldest person in the country.
Despite her age, glamorous Grace still has an enviable five wardrobes of clothes, and has her hair styled every week.
She had two birthday parties and outlasted her daughter, Deidre McCarthy, 79, who left while her mum was still singing and chatting.
Widowed Grace said: “I may be 111 but I don’t feel any different than I did at 21.”
For the past 60 years, she has knocked back a glass of Teacher’s whiskey before bed, and still enjoys a party.
She added:
“Now I’m getting older I have a little drop of water with it every night. It helps me to sleep well.”
Before she tied the knot with husband Leonard in 1933, Grace worked as a milliner and took pride in her matching outfits, including co-ordinated hats and shoes.
Deidre said: “She’s a very elegant lady. When she ran a milliner’s shop she was into wearing a complete outfit every day.
“She’s got more shoes than some shoe shops.”
Grace celebrated her birthday at a posh country hotel – on the same day the world’s oldest woman, Violet Brown, passed away aged 117 in Jamaica.
And she had another party at her home in sheltered accommodation in Broadway, the Cotswolds, Worcs.
Her daughter added: “She had another lovely cake and she was singing and chatting away. She was the life and soul.
“I left about 6.30pm and she was still at it.”
Grace still has some years to go to match the astonishing lifespan of the oldest supercentenarian on record, Jeanne Calment of France, who died in 1997 aged 122 years, 164 days.
Deidre said: “We were very worried when my father died because they were very close and you hear of so many people who lose heart and give up when that happens.
“But we looked after her and she kept going.
“She’s a very positive person and never seems to worry about anything.
“She’s also very lively and interested in everything and everyone. She loved moving around.
“She’s the kind of person who cannot understand why anybody would want to live the quiet life.”
