Published: September 03, 2008 09:44 am         

Local resident blows past 104 with birthday celebration

By Lacie Morrison
lmorrison@mineralwellsindex.com

Seventeen U.S. presidents have served in the White House since Mineral Wells resident Jewel Naomi Walls Pattillo was born.

When asked who she planned on voting for in the upcoming election, Pattillo appeared surprised.

“Who am I going to vote for? That’s supposed to be a secret,” she replied.

Pattillo celebrated her 104th birthday Tuesday with cake and balloons at the Palo Pinto Nursing and Rehab Center surrounded by well-wishers, friends and her nephew and niece. She recently moved to the facility from her Mineral Wells home.

“She’s the only one left in her generation,” remarked Pattillo’s nephew, R.T. Walls. “She keeps telling us things she did as a girl. … She taught at about 20 different schools.”

Pattillo was born in Lone Camp in 1904, the youngest daughter of a pioneer family. At the age of 17, she started teaching school in a one-room schoolhouse in Coalville, sometimes riding a horse to work. She also taught in Chick Bend, Spanish Fort, Lone Camp and Tarrant County from the 1920s until she retired and returned to Palo Pinto County in 1988.

“They use to paddle the children’s hands [as a form of punishment],” said Pattillo’s niece, Mildred Walls. “She still has that paddle.”

Walls added, “I asked her what she attributed her long life to and she said, ‘milk.’”

Palo Pinto County Judge Mike Smiddy presented Pattillo with a certificate in her honor, proclaiming Sept. 2, 2008, as “Jewel Walls Pattillo Day” throughout the county “in grateful recognition of the contribution of [Pattillo] to the enrichment and benefit of all of the family of Palo Pinto County, Texas, and in honor of her 104th birthday.”

Pattillo said her birthday party was a good surprise. She held roses in her lap as she blew out her candles.

“They are so beautiful,” the Dallas Cowboys fan remarked.