(With Ina, from left, her great-granddaughter Ali, granddaughter Rachel, son Huntley)
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
When Ina Mann was born on December 21, 1907, West Seattle had only been part of the city of Seattle for five months.
Of course, we should note she wasn’t here at the time – she was born in England. But the 104-year-old has been here long enough to merit honorary Seattle native status.
We met Ina and members of three generations of her family recently at Arbor Heights Adult Family Home. Ina has lived there for about five years and it’s clear the caregivers dote on her, as of course do her family members.
Caregiver Penny Nemoede: “When she moved in, she was 99 and we thought she was going to be here short-term. She just keeps going, like the Energizer Bunny!”
Penny was our interpreter, of sorts, during our interview – Ina is hearing-challenged, so Penny relayed our questions with a sort of hug given while delivering them, loudly, into her left ear.
Centenarians aren’t just admired these days, they are also studied for clues and secrets. One thing Ina has, we’re told, is apparently fairly common to people who live that long:
She has all her teeth. Well, ALMOST all of them – “I had two or three out,” she corrects her caretakers as they brag about her enduring smile. She attributes her dental health to frequent brushing.
So let’s go back to the beginning – Ina’s beginning. She was born Alexandrina Whitehead on December 21st, 1907, in England. In her early childhood, her family (including two younger siblings) emigrated, traveling through Canada and finally ending up in Seattle. Why Seattle? Her mother’s sister lived here.
She has memories of attending West Seattle’s old Jefferson School, which used to stand where Jefferson Square is now. “Good ol’ Jefferson,” Ina smiles. Her memories come in bits and pieces – including nostalgia for a “little ferry” that “crossed the river.” She has a lot of public-transportation memories, perhaps because she never got a driver’s license, explaining she “got too nervous.” Of course, driving wasn’t a big deal yet when she came of age; her family recalls Ina telling stories “about California being a dirt road with horses.” But her other memories include transportation imprints – having to take two buses to get to one of the jobs she held before she got married, “typing and checking orders” for Hostess Baking.
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With a life spanning 104 years, there are memories few others can share. But Penny and her team have heard them, as of course have Ina’s family. There’s the tale of the party during Prohibition, when neighbors called the police, and everyone panicked, “dumping a bunch of home-brewed beer down the toilet – they didn’t want police to see that.” Somebody else threw bottles of beer out the window.
Ina speaks slowly but humor and good nature flash abundantly as she speaks – including pranks played on her like the time her son was mad at her for some reason and got revenge on her by swapping salt for sugar in the sugar bowl just as Ina was having friends over.
Her son, Huntley Mann, 79 years old, is her only child; he is there in the Arbor Heights living room as we visit with Ina, as is one of his seven children (all daughters), Rachel Bigliardi, and her daughter Ali Bigliardi, who graduates from Seattle Lutheran High School this year. Ina also has 26 great-grandchildren and 2 great-great-grandchildren, according to her family. Some of her old family photos are displayed nearby, including this one of Ina with Huntley in 1951, when she would have been a mere 44:
Of course we ask Ina about her secret for living so long. At first, she throws her hands up in the air, “Ask anybody! I don’t know why,” and then reconsiders with a grin, “Maybe I drank enough whiskey!”
Penny suggests Ina’s longevity may be a hint that sugar’s not all bad – observing that the 104-year-old is a fan of shortbread, butterscotch, and chocolate.
Or maybe it was all the exercise in younger years, though she stays home these days. She recalls walking to Alki from her home in the Admiral district; her son remembers renting a vacation home on the beach. And she has some memories of Luna Park – likely swimming, since its time as an amusement park ended when she would have been just six, but its natatorium (swimming pool) continued on for years until fire destroyed it and what was left of Luna Park in 1931.
Her husband’s been gone for decades. They lived a no-nonsense life, by her account, from a “small, plain wedding” to a brief period of living away from Seattle, in Monterey, California, while her husband was skipper on a fishing boat based there. But West Seattle eventually drew them back.
Ina lived in her own home into her 90s; the home now belongs to her granddaughter. She did yard work even well into her later years and remembers the lilies in the yard, the old neighbor who still lives next door. Besides having all – wait, most – of her teeth, we are told she wasn’t on any medication till the past few years, just taking nutritional supplements. And the only reason she has some medicine now is the “diagnosis of old age,” it’s explained. She needs a little oxygen now and then, but otherwise, for 104, she’s doing great.
Her granddaughter Rachel says it’s always “really fun to come visit her and find out things we don’t know. She loves it here – they have taken the best care of her; she gives reports on the people who come and go, and you leave laughing after you come visit.”
With that observation, it strikes us that Ina has two families – her relatives, and the Arbor Heights Adult Family Home team, who also posed for a photo with her:
Penny says she and her family started the home 18 years ago and can care for up to six residents at a time, “long-term care in a residential setting,” for people who “don’t need skilled nursing, but do need regular supervision and care with the activities of daily living.” She says they “build relationships, and it becomes like a foster home – we strive to have them feel it’s like home – the next best thing to home.”
P.S. We have no way to tell for sure whether Ina is the oldest person in West Seattle. If you do know of anyone older (or honestly, anyone else over 100), please let us know – we’d be interested in meeting them too!
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