Party thrown for remarkable Wigan 100-year-old still living at home

Dorothy Bentham, who hit the headlines eight years ago by having a surprise party at the gym she then regularly attended, is still living independently in Pemberton and with minimal assistance.

Some 30 guests, including loved ones from Australia and other parts of Britain, descended on Gathurst Golf Club for a slap-up party.

Dorothy was born in Standish but has lived in the Pemberton and Newtown area since the 1950s.

She worked in both a clothing factory and a munitions factory during World War Two. And along with her late husband Sydney whom she married in 1948, she owned the Bentham’s fish and chip shop on Victoria Street for 26 years before retiring.

Arthritis has meant Dorothy isn’t as mobile as she was, but son Geoffrey says her spirit and determination are as bright as ever.

Standing proudly next to her large birthday cake was a card bearing birthday greetings from the King and Queen.

Inevitably Dorothy was asked about the secret of her longevity to which she said: “I’ve been asked this a lot lately and in all honesty I don’t know.

"I simply get up each day and make the best of it. I do what I can and if there are things I can’t do I don't worry about them.

"I can’t believe that I have lived 100 years though. It does not seem to have been such a long time since I was a child.”

As far as the party was concerned, Dorothy said: “It was marvellous, I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

"It was wonderful to see so many relatives who had come from Leeds and Brighton and even Australia. I never dreamt that my granddaughter would come all the way from Down Under.

"The cake was very, very nice too: it came from Greenhalgh’s in Pemberton where I often go when I’m doing the shopping.”

Longevity is clearly in the family as Dorothy’s brother Gordon is now 97, although he is in a nursing home.