This week’s writing prompt is Last One Standing. This led me to want to write about my 2nd great-grandmother Susan Palmer Kennedy who died at the age of 106 1/2 years old and was the oldest living resident in Perry County and in southeastern Ohio at the time of her death. In her obituary it states she died of senility, that must have come on only in the last months or year of her life, for she was still quite sharp on her 104th birthday. I had read she was blind the last year of her life, and that led to her spending more time in her room.

On her 106th birthday, she received a letter from then President Herbert Hoover, and also from the then Governor of Ohio, George White.

At the age of 102, it was written in a newspaper article about her that she claimed to be the oldest living mother of a son who fought and died in the US Civil War. Her oldest child, a son, John Davis Kennedy, Jr. fought and died in the Civil War on the Union side.

Susan Palmer was born 22 September 1825 in Centre County, Pennsylvania. I almost share a birthday with her, mine is the day before. She died 18 February 1932 in New Lexington, Perry County, Ohio. She was the daughter of John Palmer and Mary Ann Spots (Spatz). She migrated with her family in a covered wagon from Pennsylvania to Ohio. She stated that she walked along the wagon most of the journey.

She married 17 October 1844 in Perry County, Ohio to John Davis Kennedy. You may read more about his Kennedy roots here and about his Davis ancestors here. He also fought in the US Civil War on the Union side. He died in a mining accident on 8 October 1873 in Maxville, Perry County, Ohio. She outlived him by 58+ years.

They had numerous children: John Davis Kennedy, Jr., Abraham G. Kennedy, Mary Jane Kennedy Marlowe, George W. Kennedy, Afred P. Kennedy, Amanda Jane Kennedy Hoy Castor, Laura Ellen Kennedy Johnson, Ida Alice Kennedy Whipps, and Charles Henson Kennedy.

She was quite the character in some ways. She smoked a pipe most of her life. Above is one of the newspaper articles from her 102nd birthday. She is pictured with her son Alfred P. “A.P.” Kennedy, and the pipe she smoked is laying above the newspaper clippings. Below is another newspaper clipping from her 103rd birthday where she discusses that she only smokes the strongest brands of tobacco in her old clay pipe, which she smokes seven days a week.

Side note: My great-grandfather Abraham G. Kennedy lived to be 91 years old, he fell and hit his head and that was the cause of his death. Two of his siblings lived to be 88 years old, but he was the only one to make it into the 90s. Abraham G. Kennedy did have a son, James Worthington Kennedy, who lived to be 101 1/2 years old.

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