Betty Jones is one of just a few to receive a card from both Queen Elizabeth II and King Charles
ONE of Wales’ oldest women marked her 106th birthday by receiving cards sent from all across the globe.
Betty Jones, who lives at Penylan House Nursing Home, is affectionately called Aunty Betty by all who know her.
People from as far as Australia, Canada and the United States have sent congratulations to her on her birthday.
Flor Nessbert, who has cared for Betty since 2015, posted a request for cards on social media in the hope of receiving 106 – one for each year of Betty’s life.
She ended up getting more than 300.
Helen Ackerman, one of Betty’s daughters said: “She had a wonderful day on her birthday. My brother just could not believe it when he saw her – he said she looked about 80 years old!”
Betty has two daughters and one son, eight grandchildren, 30 great grandchildren and 17 great great grandchildren.
Ms Nessbert said: “I started working here a year after she came here. I see Betty every day and she hasn’t changed.
“She’s always been very cheeky and she’s always been very chatty.”
When asked what her secret to looking so young was, Betty simply said: “Nothing.”
King Charles sent Betty a birthday card for the second year in a row, as the monarch sends a card every year after the age of 105.
Betty is one of the few people alive to have received a centenarian card from two reigning monarchs, after Queen Elizabeth II sent a card on her 100th birthday in 2018.
Wales’ newly elected First Minister, Vaughan Gething, also wished Betty a happy birthday.
Betty was born in Loughor, Swansea, on March 24, 1918, at the tail end of WWI and just before the start of the Spanish Flu pandemic.
A century later, she would see another, as the Covid-19 pandemic struck in 2020.
Betty caught the virus, but Helen said: “She was not affected at all by it. The last few years her health has been quite good.”
Her father was a miner and when she was six she lost him just days before Christmas.
Betty married steelworker Robert ‘Bobby’ Jones in 1939, and worked a variety of jobs over the years – such as a pharmacist and a shopkeeper.
But her life was for her family, and she dedicated herself to caring for her husband in the later years of his life before he died in 2000.
Old photos of Betty and her family.
> Read more about Aunt Betty’s life here.
Jelton Moyo, the manager of the care home, said: “She is part of Penylan, she is part of the property and it is our joy to look after her.
“We feel proud of what Betty is achieving and feel part and parcel of her age is Penylan.”
