Fort Bragg resident Rachel Serrano celebrates her 101st birthday
FORT BRAGG, CA >> On Sunday, April 7, Rachel Serrano celebrated her 101st birthday with family and friends. Although she is now very hard of hearing and relies on lip reading, Rachel can still interact, move about with her walker, and independently complete many small, personal chores.
Scott Howell, her grandson and caretaker, who brought her to his home in Fort Bragg in 2021, said, “She has always has a `can do' attitude and strives to be as independent as possible, which is partly because of her good health.” He added, “She never gives up and loves life.”
Before 2021, her grandson flew to Southern California every two months to check her health and needs. Without the financial ability to consider an assisted living facility as an option, Scott brought her to Fort Bragg when he assessed that she should no longer live alone. “She'd do the same for me, ” he said.
Born in Bisbee, Arizona, in 1923, Rachel is a remarkable representative of real-life American history. Her loving family was poor and lived in a home with a dirt floor. She had fourteen siblings and recalls the Depression years when there wasn't always enough food for everyone.
Her grandson remarked, “She still eats very economically. She doesn't use salt, pepper, or sugar because they had none growing up. She doesn't even crave it but likes ice cream!”
When she was six years old, the family moved to Santa Ana, California, several times after that, including some years in San Bernardino County.
She is now the sole sibling survivor and has tragically outlived her son and daughter. She has lived long enough to survive three husbands as well. Her three grandsons are a part of her life, as are fourteen great-grandchildren and great-greatgrandchildren. Her grandson keeps everyone up to date, including nephews, nieces, grand-nephews, and grand-nieces, via FaceBook.
At the start of World War II, Rachel came northward to the Los Angeles area, where good jobs were available. During the war, she worked as a driller on the assembly line for the P-38 Lightning warplanes.
From the war's end through the 1970s, Rachel worked as a beautician in the Los Angeles area and raised two children with her first husband. Her son died in 2020 at age 67 from lung cancer, and her daughter died in a tragic car accident in 2022 at age 73.
She met her first husband at the Lockheed assembly plant. Her second husband passed away in 1991 from natural causes. Her first and third husbands died tragically, the first by suicide in 1992 and the third due to an accidental poisoning caused by his dementia.
Her grandson Scott describes her life as connected to everyday events. Although she doesn't go to the grocery store or cook meals, she reads the local newspapers and keeps up with everything else via her e-tablet. Scott routinely gets her out into the neighborhood and to the Headlands and MacKerricher State Park for a short stroll.
According to Scott, Rachel spends time each day looking through a box of hundreds of birthday cards she has saved since she was young. “They're in pristine condition,” said Scott. “I don't know how she does it.”
He commented that he couldn't provide her with the amount of social interaction she might want, but her birthday party was “a big surprise that she loved,” he said. He also maintains a personal calendar for her to help keep her up-to-date. “Anything I can do to keep her mind from deteriorating due to the progression of age,” he said.
“Whatever she can do on her own,” he said, “makes her happy.”