A CENTENARIAN

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19136, 3 October 1936, Page 15

A CENTENARIAN

GISBORNE MAN’S MOTHER

KING’S CONGRATULATIONS

A South Notfwl* centenarian, %s..E. Vaughan; bf'Gweftldcti, fciitebraltvd hfer hundredth birthday on July • -mmv reports the Surrey Mirror and County Tost, of Reigate, Surrey, England. Mrs. Vaughan, who is %e mother of Mr. John Vaughan,, of the Memorial Home, Gisborne, >ears, her age' well, for apart from a slight deafness, and the fact that her eyesight is not so good as when she was younger, Mrs. Vaughan enjoys excellent health. A Londoner by birth, Mrs. Vaughan moved from Stoke Newington to Nutfield in 1902'. lii her 100 years she. has lived in five reigns. born-just before the end of the ragh of Wilhiim IV, who died in 1837, and has seen him followed by Qiieen Victoria,; King Edward VII and King George. V dowh to our present King Edwar<) VIII. . Thff same 103, years have seen Koege w?nark»Wa, f ?l’ in . vsbrin’s U&tune Ba.t%ft 01 Bala.--clfiva" amd Ihkerman' were • fought, the sewing machine was ipvatit&dv feHlttroforpi was first used as an anaesthetic, and Edisoa’s phonograph startled the world, as did the first practical application, oi Marconi’s system of wireless telegraphy. A few weeks ago Mrs. Vaughan read of the Queen Mary's crossing oi tin* Atlantic, arid probably pondered on the. fact that the rnrst steamship crossing: of the Atlantic. was accomplished When, she was barely two years old. likewise she saw penny postage introduced wheri she was 'hut four years’ old. She was 33’.when the Suez Canal was opened, and she was nearing her fortieth birthday when the famous Captain Webb did wnat has flow become almost, a commonplace thing, swam the English Channel from Dover to Calais. .

Mrs. Vaughan has many interesting memories of her own, too, and recalls hearing the. Minister of the former Albion Chapel, London Wall, where she attended with her parfehta, announce the Disruption of 1843. She remembers also visiting St. Path's Cathedral to see the preparations for the funeral of the great Duke of Wellington. She can remember being a passenger ;on a London railway when the iraih .was pulled by a rope. Of her six children four, a daughter and three suns, are left to Mrs. Vaug, him. .The sons are scattered in different paTts of the Empire. One of them, Mr. H. Vaughan, of East London, South Africa, with his wife, was present at 'the/; home on his mother’s birthday. Mrs. received a congratulatory message from the King, as well as several cables from. South Africa.