Jean Evans turned 105 on Tuesday, and when the staff at Newton Court asked her the secret, she gave them two words: “Good parenting.”
Four generations of her family came to the Mumbles care home to mark it: her daughter Daphne, her grandson Simon and her great-grandson Tom.
Neath girl, Mumbles since the 1960s
Jean was born on 22 September 1921 and grew up in Neath, one of four children with two sisters and a brother, all of whom she has outlived. She moved to Mumbles in the 1960s and has lived there ever since.
She worked in a shop before giving up work to bring up Daphne, who still lives locally.
The memory she keeps
Asked for a favourite memory, Jean went back nearly a century. She can still picture the day her youngest sibling was born, on New Year’s Day when she was seven, and what it did to the house.
The same feeling came round again, she says, when Daphne had Simon, and again when Simon and his wife Michelle had Tom.
The grandson on the staff
Simon is a retired firefighter and now works on the maintenance team at Newton Court, so Jean’s grandson is at the home most days.
Home manager Katie Brown said Jean had been looking forward to the party for weeks. “She is a remarkable lady,” she said, and “very much looking forward to celebrating her birthday surrounded by her family and the Newton Court team”.
Newton Court is run by Christadelphian Care Homes, a charity.
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