Mary Harris, the second-oldest living person in the United States, is celebrating her 114th birthday today in Signal Mountain, Tennessee, according to News Channel 9.
Mary Harris was born in Ithaca, New York, on 13 May 1911, to Italian immigrants Joseph Petrillose and Concetta DelMonto. She was born prematurely, weighing only 3½ pounds. Because all the baby clothes were too large, her mother kept her nestled in a shoebox lined with cotton to keep her warm. The doctor said Mary was too small to survive.
While living in Ithaca, she met her future husband, James Richard Harris of North Lexington, North Carolina, while they were both working at her brother’s dry-cleaning business. In August 1937, they got married and eventually had two daughters: Connie Pitcher and Dixie Billingsley. The couple later opened their own dry-cleaning shop, along with a 500-acre dairy farm, with Mary serving as the bookkeeper for both ventures.
After leaving New York, they spent 28 years living in Florida before eventually retiring to Ascension Living Alexian Village in Signal Mountain. Her husband passed away in September 2003 at the age of 90. On her 110th birthday, she received a letter personally signed by Pope Francis.
At the moment, she is the nation’s second-oldest resident, only after Naomi Whitehead of Pennsylvania, who turned 114 in September. Based on the LongeviQuest Atlas, she is currently the 14th oldest living person in the world.
LongeviQuest extends warm congratulations to Mary Harris on her 114th birthday.
