Today , Susannah Mushatt Jones turned a whopping 116 years old . Two days ago , the Brooklynite had the honor of being awarded aGuinness World Recordfor being the old person alive . For some view , in 1899 , the year Jones was have a bun in the oven , President McKinley signed The Treaty of Paris , set free Cuba from Spain .
agree toTIME , the likelihood of becoming a relatively sizable supercentenarian ( 110 years old or elderly ) is 1 in 5 million . Joneshas been blind from glaucomasince the old age of 100 and is almost deaf , but she ’s kept an otherwise sporting bill of wellness for years , never smoking or drinking a day in her life . “ The supercentenarian , they not only detain disability toward the very remainder of their life history but also diseases,“says ThomasPerls , a professor of medicine and the director of the New England Centenarian Study at Boston Medical Center . " In fact , they ’re often functionally sovereign and disease - free , except for some affair you ca n’t get away with like cataracts and osteoarthritis . ”
AccordingtoPerls , “ You have to have some relatively uncommon combinations of a whole bunch of genes , probably hundreds , that will help citizenry get on more slowly or protect masses from age - relate diseases . ”
But what does Jones say her arcanum is ? harmonize to her , it ’s a combination of fortune of sleep , love , positive vigour … and bacon . Every break of day , she hasfour strips of baconwith her egg . And , agree to a sign in her kitchen , “ Bacon makes everything unspoiled . ”
Jones grow up one of twelve child in a small townspeople in Alabama , learning how to pick crops with her family before be active to New York and becoming a she-goat . Although she had dreamed of becoming a teacher , she could n’t afford the instruction in her youth . So , when she get earning a decent remuneration , Jones decide to give back and start out a scholarship fund for African - American women to give them the chance to get a college Department of Education .
Until the old age of 106 , Jones had been an active member of Brooklyn ’s Vandalia Houses ’ renter patrol , where she ’s dwell for over three ten , and she has had the pleasant party of her100 niece and nephews .
And now , at 116 , she remains grateful for the amount of time she ’s been given on solid ground and permit nothing get in her way of living .
