Lethbridge senior celebrates 110th birthday

“I’ve been a little bit tied up. My husband isn’t well. The staff there were wonderful… They just picked up and kept right on going. They’re very, very good with my mother. I think they remember some of the days when she was a little more alert. She was there a lot playing (piano) for them. That was way back before Edith Cavell was rebuilt.”

While Irene Easton can’t play the piano anymore, it was a huge part of her life. She had such a good ear for music, says her daughter, that she could hear a song on the radio or even listen to a song someone sang, then play it note for note.

She even played Happy Birthday on the piano for her 100th birthday so everyone could sing along.

“She loved the piano. She loves music,” said Davis. “She would listen to the radio. She had boxes and boxes of sheet music. I think music was a major part of her life. She just really loved it.”

Growing Up

Irene Florence Easton was born in Plaistow, England, just outside of London, in 1908 to John Alexander MacDonald Wood and Florence Chiswick. She was an only child and the family came to Lethbridge prior to the First World War when she was just three years old to be with family already settled in the area.

Her father worked in the courthouse as a clerk for a time, but when the job moved to Calgary, the family remained in Lethbridge, and he began developing and printing the pictures for the drug stores in town. As she got older, Irene used to collect the film from the stores twice a day and bring them to her father for developing and printing.

When Irene was in her 20s she eloped with her fiancé, Davis’ father John Easton Jr., to Calgary in 1932.

“Both sets of parents really didn’t want them to marry, because things were very uncertain in those days. There was no healthcare, nothing to back you financially if anything happened to your husband.”

The couple moved to Cranbrook for a few years, after Irene’s husband got a job there just before they were married. Davis, who was their only child, was born nearly 12 years after the couple married.

1940s to Present

After a few years in Cranbrook, the couple moved back to Lethbridge where John took a job as a mechanic, and Irene raised their only child. She also volunteered to play piano for many of the local nursing homes, was a prominent member of the local Anglican Church, led a five-pin bowling league, was a member of the IODE (Imperial Order Daughters of the Empire, a Canadian-based charity group) and an avid square dancer with her husband, Davis recalled.

“My dad would drive her to all the nursing homes and seniors lodges several times a week. They all really loved her playing because she knew all of the songs they knew.”

She also remembers how the family took yearly trips to Radium Hot Springs and to the Elk Valley each year.

“We would go fishing or camping. There weren’t the mines and things. We used to go up to Radium and then we would drive and drive and drive until we got to Fairmont and we would go in the pools up on the hill there, and we would drive and drive and drive until we got to the hoodoos at Dutch Creek. At that time, it seemed like a long time. I think that road was gravel then.”

At the age of 87, Irene had a hip replacement and decided to move into Heritage Lodge and remained there for the next nine years.

“They all knew here there, because she used to play the piano for them,” said Davis.

Still, when her husband was taken to the Edith Cavell Centre she would continue to visit him and play piano for him when he became agitated.

“He would calm down, and gradually people would just come around. They would come in their wheelchairs or they would walk. And pretty soon she would just have a whole ring around her as she played the piano.”

Irene’s husband passed away at the age of 89.

Now, Irene has days when she is alert and wants to play piano again, and other days are spent resting in bed. Davis says there’s no secret to her long life, other than being active, enjoying her life – and good genetics.

“Her mother died when she was 90. Her mother’s mother died when she was 93, which was quite an age at that time. So, I think she had the genes for it. She enjoyed her life. She was the mother on the block that used to take the kids for walks down the coulees. We would walk all the way until we got to the powerhouse and we would slip in the door there and have a drink and sneak out again. She was one of the older mothers in the community, but the one who did the walking.”

At her birthday party recently, Davis says staff who weren’t even scheduled to work came in for the event.

“There were quite a few of the staff there that were off duty and they came in specifically for her birthday. And I think that tells something about my mother. Tells something about the staff there, too.”

by Lara Fominoff @LaraFominoff on Twitter

Lethbridge senior celebrates 110th birthday

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