World's Oldest Person, a Texan, Dead at 114

JACKSONVILLE, Texas - An East Texas woman cited as the world's oldest person has died at the age of 114.

Eunice G. Sanborn of Jacksonville died Monday morning at her home, according to Patricia Ellis of Boren-Conner Funeral Home of Jacksonville.

Sanborn had been recognized as the world's oldest person since Nov. 4, when a 114-year-old nun named Eugenie Blanchard died on the French Caribbean island of St. Barts, according to the Los Angeles-based Gerontology Research Group.

The Gerontology Research Group in Los Angeles listed her as the world's oldest person, citing data from the 1900 census. Robert Young of the group said the title now passes to 114-year-old Besse Cooper of Monroe, Ga., who is 114 years and five months old.

The group says Sanborn was born July 20, 1896, in Lake Charles, La., and moved to Texas in 1937. She has told the Tyler Morning Telegraph in November that she outlived three husbands and a daughter who died in 1996 at age 90.

Four people took turns caring for Sanborn as she lived out her years in the two-story Victorian house she bought in the 1940s after the death of her second husband Wesley Garrett, the newspaper reported in 2007.

Her daughter and her third husband shared the house with her until their deaths. Her third husband died during the 1970s, according to the Morning Telegraph.

"I don't know how long I'll be here, but I've enjoyed it," she told the newspaper in 2007. "Life is a wonderful thing if you make it that way. If you don't make it right, it isn't wonderful. If you do things right and love the Lord, you'll be all right."

A memorial service is scheduled for Thursday afternoon at the First Baptist Church of Jacksonville, Ellis said. The city of about 15,000 residents is about 100 miles southeast of Dallas.