Alabamas Oldest Resident Celebrates 112 Years;

Honoring a super milestone of a super life, is the subject of this week’s Feel-Good Friday.

Goals, y’all. 

I turned 60 in August, beating the chances for a number of of the ladies in my household, including three of my sisters. For years I’ve claimed the dispensation of my great-uncle Louis, who lived to be 108, and was as sharp as a tack until the day he died. 

One of the scriptures I maintain on to with this is Moses’ blessing to the tribe of Asher in Deuteronomy 33:25: “May the bolts of your gate be iron and bronze, and may your strength match your days.” While I do all the practical things to help that along, my days are ultimately in God’s hands. Which is why it is amazing to see God’s hand at work in the long life of a local inspiration. 

Mrs. Lillie Cunningham is Florence, Alabama, and Alabama state’s oldest living resident, and on September 26, she will celebrate 112 years on this earth. Mrs. Cunningham is in a rare club known as the Supercentenarians.

Mind blown. 

Mrs. Cunningham was born on Sept. 26, 1914, in Lauderdale County, on the banks of the Tennessee River. She has lived her entire life in the same place, which I find quite incredible. Mrs. Cunningham has lived through World War I and II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts, and now the Iran conflict. She survived the 1918 Spanish Flu epidemic and the COVID pandemic. 

Like my own mother, Mrs. Cunningham grew up when Jim Crow laws controlled the Deep South and restricted the rights of Black Americans. She was able to experience life when her God-given liberties were wrongfully restricted, and now experiences those liberties without restriction. That is massive on any scale.

Mrs. Cunningham has lived through 20 Presidents of the United States, and was of the age to vote in 15 of those elections. In an interview Mrs. Cunningham did for NPR to commemorate her 110th birthday, she said she was looking forward to voting in the November 2024 election. Her message for the people who don’t bother to vote, especially the youthful technology, ought to serve as a wake-up call.

“I tell them to make sure to vote because at one time I couldn’t vote or do anything. So, those that don’t vote now, I ask them why they don’t vote, because they have a chance to do things now that I didn’t do when I was coming up,” she says.

Lessons, y’all. 

There is an unbelievable weight and depth to anybody who embodies this a lot historical past, so celebrating another yr of Mrs. Cunningham’s super life is a enormous deal. 

It’s also consultant of the wonder of small city life. In my three years in the South, I’ve gotten to hear about and know some unbelievable people who are merely dwelling their best lives without expectation or recognition. These are the people who can educate us the most, and deserve to be acknowledged as nicely as platformed. 

According to Longeviquest, the oldest dwelling individual in the United States is Naomi Whitehead of Greenville, PA, at the moment at 115 years previous and counting. So, Mrs. Cunningham is giving her a run for her money. For Mrs. Cunningham’s a hundred and tenth birthday, she acquired over 200 birthday playing cards from people across the United States, but everybody hopes to see that quantity topped for her 112th. 

Cunningham recollects growing up on a farm and going to church. She has outlived her 4 siblings — as nicely as her husband — and has more than 100 nieces, nephews, great-nieces and great-nephews.

“I’ve been working ever since I was able to put a flour sack around my neck and pick cotton, chop cotton,” she says. “So, that’s just about almost all I did growing up. Was in a field chopping cotton, picking cotton … go to school, go to Sunday school and on to church.”

Mrs. Cunningham never misses church and still attends Rock Primitive Baptist Church, where she has been an energetic member since childhood. She attends church every Sunday and reads her Bible every evening and every morning. I need to constantly make use of that behavior, meditating on God’s phrase both day and evening. I’m sure this is a enormous half of what has stored her thoughts sharp and her steps secure.

Mrs. Cunningham provides all glory to God for holding her secure and sound through not just all the world occasions, but every day.

“I just always had faith and trust in God that he was going to carry us through regardless of what other people said,” Cunningham says.

Mrs. Cunningham labored nicely into her 80s, so that’s one thing else on which to take notice. According to her grand-nephew, she had hip surgical procedure at 102, and was strolling around a week later. Mrs. Cunningham still drove herself around up until two years in the past. When Mrs. Cunningham is just not at church, she still loves to cook, watch sport exhibits, and does crossword puzzles. 

Simply superb. 

Kaytrina P. Simmons is the Florence metropolis councilwoman for Cunningham’s district, and kindly provided these photographs of Mrs. Cunningham for use in this article. Simmons is happy to have fun another milestone birthday with Mrs. Cunningham, and provides her glowing reward: “She’s great,” Simmons said. “This is wonderful, and I am honored to be her councilwoman.”

I invite you to be part of in this celebration and bathe Mrs. Lillie Cunningham with love, kindness, and honor as she continues to make historical past. 

You can ship birthday playing cards for Mrs. Cunningham to this tackle. Simmons would love to obtain all playing cards by September 21 in order to current them to her on her birthday on the twenty sixth of this month.

Mrs. Lillie Cunningham
c/o Kaytrina Simmons
P.O. Box 44

Florence, AL 35631

Editor’s Note: At RedState, it is not all about politics and coverage. We like to carry consideration to what’s good in the world, with columns like “Feel-Good Friday,” “Start Your Weekend Right,” and “Hoge’s Heroes.”

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