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The records for this work have been submitted by Rhonda Faulkner 
Email Address: <rofaulkner@infoave.net> All rights reserved.   
February, 2001.
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FROM THE GASTON GAZETTE
1980

"SAMANTHA BROOKS - She's 102; raw onions and clean living got her there-By
Sally Griffin Gazette Staff Reporter:

At 102, Samantha Brooks may be the oldest mother in Gaston County.
"I'm working on my second hundred years now," the woman said this morning.
"During my lifetime, I've had allkinds of sicknesses - flu and that kind of
thing - but I'm still holding on."

Born January 6, 1878, in Bryson City, Mrs. Brooks spent her youth helping
her parents in their apple orchards and gardens.  She remembers the farm
life and the hard work, but she says she doesn't remember how much
schooling she had.  "That was too long ago for me to remember much about, "
she said.  "But I do remember my five brothers and two sisters working with
me in the fall to harvest those apples."

It was in the gardens and orchards that Mrs. Brooks learned the value of
fresh fruits and vegetables in one's diet.  And that's part of the reason
she has lived so long, she says. 
"Eating a raw onion every day helps you to stay healthy and live a long
time," she said.  "So does just plain clean living."
Members of the staff at Guardian Care Convalescent Center, where she has
lived since 1972 say that until Mrs. Brooks became bedridden, she kept a
pot of onions growing on her windowsill, pulling up at least one a day and
eating it.

"I never smoked cigarettes nor drank whiskey either," she said.  "That
stuff isn't good for people."

Mrs. Brooks says she has read "all of the Bible I can understand" a number
of times, but that recently, poor eyesight has caused her to rely on her
memory for favorite passages.

"They removed cataracts from my eyes several years ago and I haven't been
able to see real good since then," she said.  "but I can remember a lot of
words from the Bible so I just call them back to my mind."
Although she never had any children of her own, she has reared and educated
an adopted daughter and looked after countless other children while their
mothers worked.  She also has outlived three husbands.
"I love children and they love me," she said.  "I never actually had any of
my own but that doesn't matter.  I love them whether they are mine or
somebody else's."

After her daughter was grown, Mrs. Brooks says, the absence of young voices
in her home and the death of her second husband was hard for her, so she
took a job in Asheville keeping house and caring for children while their
mother worked.

When those children became old enough to look after themselves, she moved
to Stanley to keep children for someone else.  It was there, at the age of
70, that she met and married her third husband, Luther Brooks.
Would she marry again?
"No absolutely not," she said.  "I've been alone so long now that I've
forgotten how to court."

NOTE:  Samantha DeHart Brooks daughter of Allen A.
DeHart and Fannie Nichols DeHart.  Samantha was born in 1878 in Bryson
City, NC and died November 9, 1981 in Gastonia, NC at the age of 103.