Newspaper Article 2017 – Olive hits 100 so parties for four days

Olive hits 100 so parties for four days

By Ruby Harfield
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Nearly 100 guests helped Hastings woman Olive Trotter celebrate a century on Saturday afternoon.

Mrs Trotter’s birthday festivities were held with about 90 friends and family from all over the country at Hastings Baptist Church.

The centenarian said she was pleased to mark the occasion, although she didn’t feel any different yet, and was more interested in making sure guests had a lovely time.

“If it all goes off well, it will be beautiful. I hope everyone has a happy afternoon.

“I just feel myself, I suppose. I haven’t had anything like this before, it’s a new experience.”

The Eversley Rest Home and Village resident’s actual birthday is today but she is having four days of celebrations to mark such a big milestone and on Saturday had already received many cards and flowers from well-wishers.

Her daughter, Myra Bowman, who travelled from Te Kuiti for the occasion, said Saturday’s celebration was the start of the festivities, with a five-piece band playing for Mrs Trotter at the retirement village yesterday, a family lunch today and a high tea at Eversley tomorrow.

“She will be exhausted but it’s lovely to be able to celebrate it with her.”

Her family was proud of her and she had kept in quite good health, although her eyesight was not what it used to be, Mrs Bowman said.

Mrs Bowman worked out online that her mother would be 36,524 days old today, which she found pretty impressive.

Mrs Trotter was born in Whanganui on August 21, 1917, one of six children, and moved with her family to Hastings when she was about 18 months old.

She grew up on an orchard her father bought off a Chinese market gardener on Kaiapo Rd.

In her early 20s, while a housekeeper on a farm in Hawke’s Bay, she met her husband, Jim, who was working there and had cut his hand, which she bandaged.

They married four weeks after Mr Trotter returned home from World War II and they had three children – Mrs Bowman, Gordon Trotter, of Hastings, and Alexandra Werner (now living in California, who could not make the celebrations).

The family now includes six grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren.

The devoted mother and churchgoer has spent most of her life in the Bay and moved to the rest home a few years ago.

Photo caption – JOYFUL OCCASION: Hastings resident Olive Trotter, who turns 100 today, is pictured with her grandson Regan Trotter on day one of her birthday celebrations on Saturday.   PHOTO/DUNCAN BROWN