PA woman celebrates 100th birthday
Sep 30, 2007

By Randy Trick
Peninsula Daily News

Vivian "Riley" Blake is older than cars.

She was born Sept. 28 1907, the year before Henry Ford created the Model-T, which is generally regarded as the first affordable automobile, the car that put America on wheels.

Blake has also lived during 18 presidential administrations.

Those were two interesting tidbits written on a proclamation from the city of Port Angeles, read at the celebration of Blake's 100th birthday at the Park View Villas retirement community in Port Angeles on Friday.

Blake, smiling and with freshly styled hair – the winner of first- and second-place ribbons a this year's Clallam County Fair for two crocheted afghans – was the center of attention.

OUTLIVED SIBLINGS
Showing a rich sense of humor and strong faith, she said she isn't sure why she's still on the Earth after 100 years, outliving her five younger siblings by 20 years.

"I don't know why God smiled, but he did," she said.

Cake, coffee and the city proclamation marked the occasion.
She had received letters from the White House, Gov. Chris Gregoire and Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels.

A pinochle maven and an avid reader, Blake is quick to quip and to charm her visitors.

"I'm trying to use the good brain God gave me," she said.

"I have been like any other person…I live day to day as a decent human being."

In her century of life, she has seen many changes in both technology and people.

She remembers a heated discussion between two of her friends, both teachers, in 1987 about whether personal computers would rob people of their individuality or herald a new era of freedom.

She remembers when, as she put it, children weren't as pampered and had chores and work around the house to do.
She certainly had to work hard as a child, she said.

As a young girl, Blake's family sometimes struggled in Sequim and Carlsborg to find housing and food.
Her father, Don Joseph Carlos Cramer, was once employed moving the caskets from the graveyard on the land where Pioneer Park is now to the Sequim View/Dungeness Cemeteries.

At 16, Blake married Gus Strange of Pysht.

She returned to high school when her first daughter, Mildred, enrolled in the first grade.

HIGH SCHOOL DIPLOMA"That's one thing in my whole life that I'm most proud of," she said.

She graduated from Clallam Bay High School in 1932, at 24 years old, after arguing before the School Board that a married woman deserved to be readmitted.

After Blake was allowed to attend high school and gradate, she set a precedent; three young women after her earned their degrees and went to college.

"Because of me, three women got a higher education," she said.

Blake divorced Strange and, in 1944, married Aubrey Blake.

WORLD WAR II WELDER
During World War II, Blake worked in the Seattle shipyards, joining a corps of women welders.

She worked for 10 years as the head of cashiers for Group Health Cooperative, then 10 years as an office manager with the Seattle branch of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers union.

She worked as a secretary for state Rep. Bob Perry, representing Kirkland and Woodinville, until 1970.

During the summer, Blake gathered her family to celebrate her birthday early.

Attending were six grandchildren, eight great-grandchildren and three great-great-grandchildren.