100-year-old Minnie Singletary celebrates milestone birthday on March 15

With her sparkly jewelry, polished nails, color-coordinated outfits and big flowers in her hair, she is just as spunky as ever after 100 years of life.

Singletary reached her milestone birthday on March 15. She celebrated her special day at The Oaks, complete with the company of her family, including cousins, grandchildren and her only child, Hyrett Hamilton of Orangeburg.

“We had a nice time. Everything was nice,” said Singletary, the grandmother of two and the great-grandmother of seven.

Her birthday gifts included money, blankets and her special request for “fancy clothes and high heel shoes.”

She was one of 10 children born to the late June and Lillian Curry in Lone Star. Her father lived until the age of 98, while her mother lived until the ripe old age of 105.

Singletary said she doesn’t feel any different after turning 100.

“I don’ t feel no different. Ain’t no difference in the feeling. I just say if I was a little younger and I see a fella, I would take him, but I’m too old,” Singletary said, laughing heartily.

Why did God let her live so long? She doesn’t know, but is grateful he did.

“Well, I believe in prayer. I was praying ever since I knew myself. I got nine sisters and brothers, all of them gone. The Lord leave me here. Now the reason? I don’t know, but I feel good about it, and I still thank him,” Singletary said.

“I don’t only thank the Lord, I thank the doctors and the nurses. The Lord sets the time. The doctor tell the nurse what he think, but the nurse got to give me the medicine, or what the doctor recommend and what the Lord says. So I thank them all, and I’ve been doing that since I know myself,” she said.

Singletary said her family was church-going people.

“We were born and raised going to church. That’s all I know — calling on the Lord for everything,” she said.

Singletary recalled her childhood in Lone Star.

“I was born and raised right around there. … I went to school there, but I graduated from Wilkinson High in Orangeburg. Everything was nice,” she said.

Hamilton said Singletary had also attended then-South Carolina State College before leaving to take care of her mother.

Hamilton said her mother worked as a professional seamstress who could sew just about anything.

“She was always the entrepreneurial type individual. She always wanted to have her own business and was very outgoing. She can sew anything without a pattern. You just give her a picture and your measurements, and she can make it,” she said.

Hamilton continued, “She’s sewed for (S.C.) State College and some of their staff. She’s actually in the archives in Columbia. They did a short documentary on her about the history of Lone Star, South Carolina. So she has a documentary that she did a long time ago.”

Singletary said she worked at New York’s famed Apollo Theatre for more than 30 years.

“My life was pretty good and nice. All my life I can’t complain. I used to work at the Apollo Theatre. I worked there 38 years teaching the girls and things how to sew, … fixing the girls and things up for the stage. Not only the girls, but the boys, too,” she said.

Singletary recalled her mother’s old foot pedal sewing machine and the eventual purchase of her first electric one.

“When I was growing up, my mama had the pedal machine. Mama made all of our clothes. So when I got big enough and old enough to get my own machine, I bought an electric machine. My mama used the foot, but I bought one that went, ‘zoom!'” she said.

Singletary continued, “Anything you wanted made, I could make it. All you got to do is give me a picture and your size. I’ve been sewing all my life.”

Hamilton said she was grateful that her mother was still alive and has admired her tenacity.

“It’s really great because she is the historian. She tells me stories from before radio and television and how she got started in business. She bought her own home at about 20. She was a very outgoing and entrepreneurial person. She had a fashion show at the Oyster Bay (restaurant) in Jersey City,” Hamilton said.

Singletary said, “I had my own business making clothes for people. Everything was nice, and the Lord was pleased with what I was doing because he got me here. All my brothers and sisters gone, but I know exactly where they’re buried at. I don’t know where they’re going, but I know where I put them.”

The 100-year-old said she eats “some of everything” and lives relatively stress-free, something which she said has contributed to her longevity.

“God is good to me. Drinking and thing, I ain’t never did that. My life was pretty nice, thanks to the good Lord and the doctors and nurses,” she said.