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Publication: CBC.ca add link
Issue: 8 March 2010
Title: P.E.I.-born woman dies at 114
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P.E.I.-born woman dies at 114

Last Updated: Monday, March 8, 2010 | 3:08 PM ET

The Associated Press

Mary Josephine Ray, born on P.E.I. and certified as the oldest person in the United States, died Sunday at the age of 114.

She died Sunday at a nursing home in Westmoreland, N.H., but was active until about two weeks before her death, said her granddaughter, Katherine Ray.

"She just enjoyed life. She never thought of dying at all," Ray said.

"She was planning for her birthday party."

Even with her recent decline, Ray managed an interview with a reporter last week, her granddaughter said.

The Gerontology Research Group says Ray was the oldest person in the United States and the second oldest in the world. She was also recorded as the oldest person ever to live in New Hampshire.

The oldest person in the world is Japan's Kama Chinen at age 114 years, 301 days, one week older than Ray.

Ray was born May 17, 1895, in Bloomfield, P.E.I. She moved to the United States at age 3, before the turn of the 20th century.

She lived for 60 years in Anson, Maine. She lived in Florida, Massachusetts and elsewhere in New Hampshire before she moved to Westmoreland in 2002 to be near her children.

Ray's husband Walter died in 1967.

Survivors include two sons, eight grandchildren, 13 great-grandchildren and five great-great grandchildren.

© The Canadian Press, 2010

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