The Sunnyvale Sun

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They're 100 years young, with many wise life lessons

By RUBY ELBOGEN

Elizabeth Dioge, 100, and Mildred Moellinger, 101, celebrated their birthdays in the Sunrise Assisted Living parlor on July 10.

The centenarians have seen many changes. Autos were very rare when they were children, so kids walked everywhere they went. The local grocery store didn't carry many items, just some of the basics. Telephones were unheard of, and pants had buttons instead of zippers.

Life was not easy; it was hard work scrubbing clothes by hand and beating rugs instead of vacuuming. Talking to friends on the phone would have to wait a few decades.

Moellinger was born in Coldwater, Mich., on July 10, 1905. She moved to San Diego when she was 8 years old. Her mother had died when she was just 4, leaving Moellinger and her sisters, ages 3 and 2, to be raised by their grandmother.

Moellinger's first husband was killed in an explosion aboard ship while serving in the Navy in 1936. She remarried in 1937. Moellinger and her husband, Al, raised two daughters, Marilyn Lane and Patricia Janda. Now she has four grandchildren, four great-grandchildren and two great-great grandchildren. She worked as a waitress, cooked for her women's club and worked on the local election board.

A major baseball fan, she loves Barry Bonds. Asked if clean living accounted for her longevity, Moellinger says "no." She didn't exercise, doesn't like healthy food and began dealing blackjack while in her 90s at the retirement home where she lived before coming to Sunrise in 2002.

Dioge, who was born in Falklands, Scotland, was pleasantly surprised with a bagpipe concert during the birthday party. As a young woman, she worked for a bakery selling baked goods from a horse-drawn wagon. Dioge emigrated to Woodside, in 1927--leaving her entire family behind in Scotland, where her father was the town blacksmith. She and her husband, a one-time gardener and nurseryman, opened the Home & Garden Nursery in Palo Alto in 1947.

Dioge is a member of the Daughters of the British Empire. She received a birthday card from Queen Elizabeth congratulating her on this special milestone. While Dioge never had children of her own, she is very close to her nephews and nieces, who were raised on the land surrounding the nursery. Her nephew, Gordon Lockhart of Sunnyvale, remembers the carefree times he had going from house to house on their family compound to see who had the tastiest food cooking and cookies baking in the kitchens.

Although she worked hard at the nursery, Dioge always had time for her friends, and she still sees a couple of them for lunch twice a month. Her niece, Ginger Lockhart, said Dioge's home was always the gathering place for friends and relatives and that she was active in the Ming Quong Guild, raising funds for a children's home in Los Gatos.

Asked if her long life was due to consuming healthy food, Dioge remarked that if slathering butter on bread was considered healthy eating, then she supposed it was.