Ynés María de Jesús Garay, a resident of Cayey, Puerto Rico, is celebrating her 111th birthday today. Her birthday was first reported by the Facebook page Conociendo a Puerto Rico, which frequently features stories about Puerto Rico’s oldest citizens.
Ynés María de Jesús Garay was born in the Rincón neighborhood of Cayey, Puerto Rico, on 20 April 1915 to parents Eugenio De Jesús Cartagena and Juana Garay Tirado. At the age of 10, her family moved to the Pasto Viejo neighborhood, where she spent her adolescent years. She left school in the third grade, and began working in tobacco farming – then a booming industry in Puerto Rico – at the age of 13.
After her first marriage ended in divorce, she married Domingo Colón Ortiz in 1939. The couple would have 11 children together, and both earned a living working in a factory, where their job was to strip tobacco leaves. The family owned a farm, where they would grow crops such as sweet potato, avocado, and corn, and owned livestock which included cows, pigs, and goats. Her husband died in 1983, after 44 years of marriage.
At the moment, she is the second-oldest known living person in Puerto Rico, after the anonymous lady who turned 112 in February.
LongeviQuest extends warm congratulations to Ynés María de Jesús Garay on her 111th birthday.
