World's Oldest Person Dies At 114
With Yone Minagawa's Passing In Southewestern Japan, An Indiana Woman Inherits The Title
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Yone Minagawa receives the certificate identified as the world's oldest person by the Guinness Book of World Records at Fukuchi town in Fukuoka Prefecture of Japan in July 2007. Minagawa died at a nursing home in southwestern Japan, a home official said on Aug. 14, 2007. She was 114. (AP Photo/Kyodo News)
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The world's oldest person is now 114-year-old Edna Parker of Shelbyville, Ind. She was born on April 20, 1893, according to Guinness records.
Minagawa, who raised four sons and a daughter on her own by peddling flowers and vegetables, died Monday afternoon, said Toshiro Tachibana, an official at the nursing home in the former mining town of Fukuchi. The attending physician said Minagawa died of old age.
"Her appetite had been declining recently and her energy fading, so the family had asked us to make her as comfortable as possible. The death was not sudden," Tachibana said.
Born on Jan. 4, 1893, Minagawa was identified by the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's oldest person in January following the death of Emma Faust Tillman, also 114, in the United States.
Minagawa outlived all of her children except her daughter. She also had seven grandchildren, 12 great-grandchildren and two great-great-grandchildren, according to the nursing home.
Minagawa usually spent her days at the home resting, but seldom missed a weekly recreational sing-along, staff at the home said earlier this year. She had a sweet tooth and was particularly fond of Japanese cakes filled with sweet bean paste.
Parker lives at Shelbyville's Heritage House Convalescent Center about 25 miles southeast of Indianapolis. She was born in central Indiana's Morgan County, growing up on a farm before becoming a schoolteacher.
She taught in a two-room school in the Shelby County town of Smithland for several years until she wed her childhood sweetheart and next-door neighbor, Earl Parker, in 1911.
The same year, she graduated from Franklin College with a degree in education. But as was the tradition of that era, her teaching career ended with her marriage. She began the arduous life of a farm wife, preparing meals for as many as 12 men who worked on her husband's farm.
Parker, who had two sons, both of whom she has outlived. Her husband died in 1938.
The world's oldest man is also Japanese — Tomoji Tanabe, 111, born on Sept. 18, 1895. Tanabe lives in the southern city of Miyazaki, according to Guinness World Records.
Fukuchi is about 520 miles southwest of Tokyo.
© MMVII The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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The secrets of tennis legend 
Everytime you turn around
the world's oldest person is dropping dead!
...what next?
Posted by xzavierbrown at 04:20 PM : Aug 14, 2007
Only in the sense that neocon republicans exist. If there was a god all of them would be dead and then life would get a whole more worth living.
Posted by SgtRDS at 05:59 PM : Aug 14, 2007
-Very important issue. It shows how national economies have to get ready and adpt to newer realities of elderly cares. Stretching the age of survival had immediate consequences on the availability of nursing services in some Northern European countries. (Lack of registered nurses has caused their salaries to skyrocket recently, lucky b*tches!)
Posted by xzavierbrown at 04:20 PM : Aug 14, 2007
Only in the sense that neocon republicans exist. If there was a god all of them would be dead and then life would get a whole more worth living.
Posted by SgtRDS at 04:10 PM : Aug 14, 2007
+ report abuseyou must have a very cra ppy life..
Parker lives at Shelbyville's Heritage House Convalescent Center about 25 miles southeast of Indianapolis. She was born in central Indiana's Morgan County, growing up on a farm before becoming a schoolteacher.
She taught in a two-room school in the Shelby County town of Smithland for several years until she wed her childhood sweetheart and next-door neighbor, Earl Parker, in 1911.
The same year, she graduated from Franklin College with a degree in education. But as was the tradition of that era, her teaching career ended with her marriage."
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At the age of 18, Mrs. Parker had taught school for %u201Cseveral%u201D years, while at the same time, achieving a college degree in education. She stopped teaching in 1911 upon marrying Earl Parker.
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This Lady achieved more in her first 18 years of life than many people do in a whole lifetime. What could/would she have achieved in the next 96 years if tradition had not caused her to settle for cooking for farmhands.
WOW
Have you noticed how these "World's Oldest Persons" keep dying?
It's like becoming the World's Oldest Person is a death sentence or something.
...
moral of story :
If Guinness Book of World Records offers you the title of oldest person, don't accept it.
- by grammawhamma August 14, 2007 6:08 PM EDT
- The attending physician said Minagawa died of old age.
- Reply to this comment
See all 12 CommentsThe autopsy will show she really died from second hand smoke!
The death was not sudden," Tachibana said.
I'll say...since it took her 114 years to die.
RIP