The Community Times Dispatch

Hundreds gather for matriarch’s multi-day birthday celebration At 100 years of age, Eva Doctor maintains a caring, humorous, feisty vigor and strength of mind to entertain five generations of family and friends.

Doctor’s one hundredth birthday was August 20, 2009. Several hundred family members participated in her multi-day centennial celebration.

As a mother of twelve children marking ten decades, Doctor had an opportunity to interact with five generations of offspring. On Friday, August 21^st, family members and friends conducted a praise celebration at Cypress Creek Christian Church in Walterboro. Doctor recalled a woman of 103 years of age attending the worship service with her.

Doctor’s granddaughter Claudette, of Ohio, said that she was pleased to respond to people inquisitive about her grandmother’s state of mind.

“When I told people I was going to a 100^th year celebration of my grandmother, they asked me was she in her right mind,” she said. “I told them that I am sure she is, because every time I call she says, ‘Is this Claudette?’.”

Claudette was among hundreds of family members present at Eva Doctor’s home for at Saturday afternoon for a daylong picnic honoring the matriarch. Mildred Yates of Ruffin, South Carolina is one of Eva Doctor’s daughters that were also present at the multi-day event. Yates chuckled as her mom sat on the front porch of her home on Little Elbow Drive in Walterboro and talked candidly about her favorite foods.

“Grits and bacon,” she said firstly after being asked about her diet. Okra was up on the list. “I love fried okra.”

Doctor’s granddaughter Claudette, attributed Doctor’s eating of home-grown food as one factor that could possibly have help her grandmother to have such a quality of life at 100 years of age.

One of Doctor’s sons was sharing how proud he was of his mother and said that she looked good for an old woman. She quickly disapproved of his characterization.

“Don’t call me an old woman,” she said adamantly.

Chances are she will be watching westerns on television if you stop by to visit.

“I can watch westerns all day…put it on the westerns channel and don’t move it,” she said.

When her grandson Tony Yates came to greet her on the porch, she nearly caught him with a deliberate right jab. She laughed and welcomed Yates with a great big hug instead. Names of relatives not mentioned here would extend beyond the natural size of this article, but are not considered less important than the few names mentioned.

May Eva Doctor enjoy her continued life and wellness, Happy Birthday from The Dispatch.