Jeanette Mary Katherine was born in Garden City, Kansas. Her parents are originally from Germany, and never learned English.

She is the 13th child and has 5 older brothers, and 7 older sisters. Unfortunately all have passed away, but one of her older sisters who is very ill.

Jeanette grew up on a farm and never really had technology except farming tools.

She loved going to school and enjoyed the bus coming to pick her up and having good teachers.

Growing up she was always a busy bee, taking care of the farm, family, and going to school.

Mary had dreamed of being a nun when she grew up, but her mom did not allow it and never became a nun.

Some traditions she had growing up were having Sunday dinner with the whole family every week.

Her favorite food was her mom's homemade chicken and noodles with mash potatoes on the side.

Her first job was taking care of her nephew at 7 years old and when she was 18 she worked at a drugstore for $20 a week.

First car was an old beat up Ford, she got from a family friend who owned a little car shop, the deal was if she made payments then she could get the car.

A historical event that Mary remembers is the JFK assassination. She was home alone watching TV when it happened.

Being from Garden City Mary said she would like to go back to her homeland, but has no family to see there.

Mary met her husband Charlie at a beech aircraft, both of them started working there around the same time. They had 2 weddings, one was at her nieces house and then 6 months later they had another wedding at the catholic church. Her husband charlie had just been released out of the hospital for their first wedding which is why they wanted to get married quick. They had the pastor come over to her nieces house to get them married on May 28, 1954.

She has no children, but adores them. She likes to think of every kid or baby she's ever taken care of as one of her own.

The most unforgettable memory is her husband Charlie. She thinks about him everyday and misses him. She even still has his chair that he always used to sit in. After they got married he bought her a doll since she never had a toy growing up as a child.

Growing up Mary's dad was her role model he treated her so special. Everywhere they went he would always introduce her as his little baby girl.

Mary is happy at the age she is (90), she wouldn't change anything about her life. She always often wonders why she's even still around, all of her family passed away earlier than 90 years old.

One of the most difficult things growing up was that she had to do a man's work, she always had to help work out on the farm from a very young age and take care of her mother who was ill and also blind.

One negative thing about getting old is being alone all the time. The loneliness is hard to get through when you have no family or children to come visit you. She does have a lady named Vicky who comes and helps take care of her and visits her. Vickys family always treats her like Mary is part of the family.

Lessons learned over life have been that everyone is a kind person. Even though most people don't see it everyone is kind. It just takes time to find the good in them.

Mary has not won any awards or prizes, but having met everyone in her life is an award.

If she could go anywhere, Mary would just stay right here in Kansas, this is her home and she wouldn't change anything about it.

One thing she would change would be her height! Growing up she was always tall (5'11) It would always difficult to find clothes that fit her good and so at one point she actually started making her own clothes because buying them became too expensive and couldn't afford it.

Best advice that Mary would give to teens is to just be a good teenager, that's one of the best parts of life is being a teen.

Finally her proudest moment was getting to take care of her parents since they always did everything for her.