Kettering dancer Gladys has a ball as she celebrates 100th birthday

Happy birthday Gladys!
Gladys celebrates her 100th birthday.Gladys celebrates her 100th birthday.
Gladys celebrates her 100th birthday.

A former Kettering dinner lady who loved to dance has celebrated reaching the age of 100.

It was a low-key affair for Gladys Garlick because of Covid-19 restrictions but she still had a fantastic day as she marked the milestone with cake in the garden on Saturday (July 11).

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Friends and family took turns to come and celebrate in a socially-distanced gathering with Gladys also receiving a card from the Queen.

Gladys as a teenager in the mid-1930s.Gladys as a teenager in the mid-1930s.
Gladys as a teenager in the mid-1930s.

Her son Melvyn said: "She gets on with absolutely everybody and she is so lovely.

"I don't think she has ever fallen out with anybody to my knowledge."

Gladys was born in Kettering's Regent Street in 1920, two years after the First World War ended, and has lived in the town her whole life.

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She left the parish church school in Dalkeith Place at the age of 14 and worked as a seamstress at Co-op Clothing until she was assigned into the munitions factory during the Second World War.

It was during the war that she married husband Leslie in 1941. She has been a widow since his death in 1991.

After her son was born Gladys, who was also a dinner lady at Kettering's Park Road school, didn't go back to full-time work.

She was a volunteer at the Shelter charity shop in Montagu Street for more than 25 years.

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Gladys, who dotes on children, was also a keen line dancer and danced weekly at St John's Hall until her early 90s.

Melvyn added: "She has always been so active and I think that's kept her going.

"Even in her 90s she was up and about dancing and it's only recently that she has started to slow down."

She has lived in the same house since 1953, where she still potters about in her garden and enjoys knitting. Gladys has two grandchildren, four great-grandchildren and two great-great-grandchildren.

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