World’s oldest particular person Lucile Randon dies at 118

Lucile Randon was born in France on February 11, 1904, when World War I used to be nonetheless a decade away. 

Lucile Randon was born on February 11, 1904 (AFP file photograph)

By Agence France-Presse: The world’s oldest identified particular person, French nun Lucile Randon, has died aged 118, a spokesman informed AFP on Tuesday.
Randon, generally known as Sister Andre, was born in southern France on February 11, 1904, when World War I used to be nonetheless a decade away.

She died in her sleep at her nursing dwelling in Toulon, spokesman David Tavella mentioned.

“There is great sadness but…it was her desire to join her beloved brother. For her, it’s a liberation,” Tavella, of the Sainte-Catherine-Laboure nursing dwelling, informed AFP.

The sister was lengthy feted because the oldest European, earlier than the dying of Japan’s Kane Tanaka aged 119 final yr left her the longest-lived particular person on Earth. Guinness World Records formally acknowledged her standing in April 2022.

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Randon was born within the yr New York opened its first subway and when the Tour de France had solely been staged as soon as.

She grew up in a Protestant household as the one woman amongst three brothers, residing within the southern city of Ales.

One of her fondest recollections was the return of two of her brothers on the finish of World War I, she informed AFP in an interview on her 116th birthday.

“It was rare, in families, there were usually two dead rather than two alive. They both came back,” she mentioned.

She labored as a governess in Paris — a interval she as soon as referred to as the happiest time of her life — for the youngsters of rich households.

She transformed to Catholicism and was baptised on the age of 26.

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Driven by a need to “go further”, she joined the Daughters of Charity order of nuns on the comparatively late age of 41.

Sister Andre was then assigned to a hospital in Vichy, the place she labored for 31 years.

In later life she moved to Toulon alongside the Mediterranean coast.

Her days within the nursing dwelling had been punctuated by prayer, mealtimes and visits from residents and hospice employees.

She additionally acquired a gradual move of letters, virtually all of which she responded to.

In 2021 she survived catching Covid-19, which contaminated 81 residents of her nursing dwelling.

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‘Work stored me alive’

Randon informed reporters final yr that her work and caring for others had stored her spry.

“People say that work kills, for me work kept me alive, I kept working until I was 108,” she informed reporters in April final yr within the tearoom of the house.

Although she was blind and relied on a wheelchair, she used to look after different aged individuals a lot youthful than herself.

“People should help each other and love each other instead of hating. If we shared all that, things would be a lot better,” she mentioned on the similar assembly with journalists.

But the Catholic nun had rejected requests for locks of hair or DNA samples, saying that “only the good Lord knows” the key of her longevity.

It is probably going that France’s new oldest particular person is now 112-year-old Marie-Rose Tessier, a girl from Vendee, longevity skilled Laurent Toussaint informed AFP.

But Toussaint warned that it was at all times doable a good older particular person had not but made themselves identified.

Jeanne Calment, who died in 1997 in Arles, southern France, on the age of 122 holds the report for the oldest confirmed age reached by any human.

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Published On:

Jan 18, 2023