105th Birthday: Mary Lloyd

She regularly visits the Malmesbury Lawn Day Centre in Havant, so it was only right for them to organise a party for Mary, to allow her to celebrate this landmark milestone.

Yvette Christian, deputy director of Age Concern Hampshire, attended the special celebration: ‘It’s phenomenal that Mary is so healthy at 105, she lives almost on her own and she’s also got quite a good memory.

‘She seems to have a good attitude towards life, in thinking that getting out and doing things when you can is good.’

Mary Hastilow was born in Stoke-on-Trent and lived there for five years, before moving to Bournemouth with her parents and two sisters.

The centenarian grew up in the area and met her husband, ‘Tubby’, who she married just before the Second World War. Aged 27, she then became Mary Lloyd.

‘I first moved to Harrow with my husband because that’s where he worked,’ says Mary, who was a housewife her whole life.

‘We then went to Hayling Island in 1959. We used to like to cycle along the beach because it was all sand then.’

Mary, who now has a grandson, went on to have two daughters with Tubby: Carol Crawford, 71 and Jill Osbourne, 69. Jill lives in Florida but came over to celebrate with her mother on the day of the party.

Mary says that Tubby, who died in 1999, had the travel bug.

‘I think my husband had itchy feet, he always wanted to go somewhere,’ she says.

‘Some of the places we visited were Kenya, Portugal, Morocco, Hong Kong and Switzerland.’

Among her favourite things to do, Mary says she loves reading and that her favourite books are mystery books.

She also used to enjoy going to America to visit Jill.

Mary, who has been visiting Malmesbury Lawn for about four years, thinks easy living and not drinking or smoking is the reason she’s reached the age of 105.

‘I go out quite a bit,’ she says.

‘I suppose that’s what keeps me going, I go to the blind club and the lunch club.

‘I think where I lived has also helped, because we have the fresh sea air, near to the beach.’