39 Was 71 Years Ago for Miss O’Hern

Miss Mary Ambrose O’Hern was celebrating yet another birthday and contemplating the joys and frustrations of her 110 years on this Earth.

“I didn’t think I’d live to be that age. I didn’t want to live to be that age,” she mused on her birthday, her frail form covered by a colorful blanket.

Want to or not, she has outlasted the presidency of Grover Cleveland, the era of horse and buggy, the invention and demise of the telegraph, the incorporation of several new U.S. states, the deaths of her four brothers and sisters, the popularity of radio shows and vinyl records, and 13 years in a Williamstown nursing home where death is a fact of life.

She is among the oldest of Americans. The oldest known person with an authenticated birth date is Jeanne Calmet, 121, who lives in France. At 114, Mary Electa Bidwell, of Hamden, Conn., is considered to be the oldest living American, according to the Guinness Book of Records.

At a mere 110, O’Hern is left with her memories of joys past: a half a century of working with children as an elementary-school teacher and principal, reminiscing about family, and playing softball with her long-dead but still beloved father.

She also recalled her birthday party and a Mass with dozens of relatives, friends and fellow residents of her nursing home. But they didn’t put any candles on the cake--much less 100 of them.

There are also her joys present: her neat flowered dress with gold earrings and birthday corsage from the staff of her nursing home, her rosary beads, reciting poetry committed forever to memory and greeting one of her former elementary pupils who has come to call for her birthday. He’s 81 but still minds his manners around her.

“She was very stern,” Julius “Pete” Le Page says slowly, emphasizing each word. “But we all respect her. She still is very much the boss.”

“She’s still a teacher, and you can tell when you talk to her that you’re a student,” said George Mercier, a staffer at Sweet Brook nursing home. “She will tell you about your grammar.”

She believes that today’s students learn faster than in her day, but teachers are not as wedded to their work and earn “big money.” At one time, she got $10 a week.

She must also endure the frustrations of her advanced age: limited sight and hearing, life in a reclining wheelchair, daily fatigue, a shaky memory of recent happenings--and late Reader’s Digests. “This is September ‘95,” she says, gesturing with disgust toward the edition on her lap. “I never get it on time.”

By all accounts, Miss O’Hern, as she is still known to her former pupils, had--and still has--a passion for rectitude, order and hard work. She once stuck an unruly student in a closet to calm him down.

“She has always been very professional, very staid,” said Helena Beamon, of Livingston, N.J., her niece and closest surviving relative. “She always worked hard.”

Known to those close to her as Mae, she was born the daughter of an Irish American shoemaker in 1886--and her birth certificate still on file at North Adams City Hall proves it. She grew up and lived most of her life in that gritty little mill city in the northwestern Berkshire Mountains. She never married and abandoned driving a car after two weeks of backseat harping from her sisters.

“My two sisters were very good drivers, and there was so much complaining, I said, ‘The heck with it!’ ” she recalls. She got rides from her sisters or walked the hilly streets of North Adams, which no doubt did her heart good.

Heredity also seems to explain some measure of her longevity. All her siblings lived to be at least 89.

She also lived an active life, kept her home in exemplary order and rode herd over a schoolhouse of teachers and pupils. “I’ve always got to be busy. I’m never idle. I never learned how to relax,” she says.

Her diet was and remains unremarkable. She never paid much attention to it. A trim woman, she ate and still eats meat and dairy products. She has attributed her longevity, perhaps with a touch of characteristic humor, to eating lots of chocolate--one of the few foods that no longer agrees with her.

Asked about her formula for long life, she has suggested her commitment to her work and her strong belief in God. But a birthday also calls for honesty: “I guess I never thought about it,” she finally admits.

Too busy living.