Friends and family gathered at Bella Lofthouse’s Ripon home at the weekend to celebrate her 100th birthday and see the card that she received to mark the occasion from King Charles III and Queen Consort Camilla.
King George V was on the throne when Ms Lofthouse was born in January 1923 as the sixth child of Mabel and Thomas Jameson.
A further four children followed and she is the last remaining sibling of a well-known and hard-working Ripon family.
Ms Lofthouse lives with her daughter Jackie Robertson, who told the Stray Ferret:
“The thing mum enjoys most is spending time with her family, especially her great grandson Isaac, who is 19 months.
“She has lived a long and happy and life and is grateful for the kindness, love and support that she receives from those who are closest to her.”
Always a hard worker, Ms Lofthouse left Holy Trinity School at the age of 14 to take her first job at McDonald’s Grocers on Market Place, and during World War II she was employed at the Royal Ordnance Factory in Thorp Arch, making bullets and cordite.
At the time of her marriage to her sweetheart George at Ripon Cathedral in 1949, she had begun to work as a domestic at Sharow View the former Ripon Workhouse on Allhallowgate (pictured above) which was then being used as a home providing care for elderly people.
Ms Lofthouse, said:
“I can honestly say that I spent some of the happiest days of my working life there. I started at Sharow View in the late 1940s and continued to work there for 30 years.
“I was working up to 48 hours a week, but I was very much appreciated by Mr and Mrs Brook who ran the place.”
To mark her 98th birthday in January 2021, Ripon Museum Trust invited Ms Lofthouse for afternoon tea in the workhouse building where she had worked for three decades and on Saturday, trust chair Richard Taylor was among the friends and family to join in celebration of her 100th
Read more: