Family toast to Florence’s century

LONGWOOD Lodge was buzzing today as residents helped great-grandmother Florence Taylor celebrate her 100th birthday.

Florence, who has lived at the Park Road nursing home in Oldham for nearly two years, was surrounded by family members to help her toast the milestone occasion.

Oldham-born Florence has one daughter, Dereta Flynn (68), two grandsons, Mark (45) and David (41) and two great-granddaughters Alexandra (8) and Victoria (6).

Florence’s mother, Annie, died when she was 15, leaving her to look after her father Fred Briggs and older brother Arthur.

She married George Whitney — a British Rail clerk — when she was 30, but he sadly died four years later, in 1948, when Dereta was only two.

She was married to Clifford Taylor, whom she met via Salem Moravian Church 15 years later, until he died in 1990.

Florence did various jobs over the years, including shop work, and enjoyed walking, knitting and ballroom dancing.

Aged 90, she travelled by plane for the first time to the Isle of Man to visit her grandson.