Pearl Morgan celebrates 105th birthday at Cumberland View
At the age of 105, this Wheelers Hill woman has never had much more than a cold. So what’s her secret to living a healthy and long life?
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It’s been “an amazing life” for the jolly Pearl Morgan, who hasn’t been seriously ill in more than 100 years.
The fighting fit great-grandmother recently celebrated her 105th birthday surrounded by family, friends and the mayor of Monash in Wheelers Hill aged-care home Cumberland View.
Ms Morgan was living independently until just two years ago and, as a lover of travel, was still gallivanting around China in her 90s, and tearing up the bowling green.
Daughter Cheryl Clarke said the key to her mother’s long, fulfilled life was her healthy lifestyle.
“Mum walked everywhere when she was young,” she said.
“She didn’t have a car.”
“She didn’t drink or smoke, and she ate good food — in those days food didn’t have preservatives.”
Ms Morgan’s uplifting attitude could also have something to do with it.
“I’ve had a good life,” she said. “It’s just been an amazing life.”
Cumberland View staff member Debbie Filippini said she was lucky to know the inspiring Ms Morgan.
“You cannot help smiling when you’re with Pearl,” she said.
“She is such a happy, happy person.”
“She’s beautiful.”
The oldest of 10 children, Ms Morgan and her 82-year-old “baby brother” — the youngest of the bunch — are the only two still alive.
Growing up in Kingsville, Ms Morgan was like a second mother to her siblings.
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She then went on to get married young and have two children of her own, and a career as a dressmaker.
During World War II, she gave up sewing dresses and helped make parachutes for the war effort.
Spending most of her life living in West Footscray, just a 15-minute walk from the Western Bulldogs’ home ground, Ms Morgan has long been a mad Bulldogs supporter.
She starred on TV celebrating the Bulldogs’ premiership win in 2016.
Ms Clarke said her mum would definitely take the title for the oldest Western Bulldogs supporter.
“But she’s a celebrity in her own right,” she said.
As an A-grade bowler, she won a host of trophies in her later years, playing in Ocean Grove and Mulgrave.