Frances celebrates 103rd birthday
Warragul woman Frances Furlong turned 103 last month.
Originally from Boort, Mrs Furlong endured many hardships in her young life brought on by shortages of food and materials that followed the First World War.
She saw the Spanish Flu pandemic come and go, and then endured the hardships of the Great Depression that lasted from 1929 for around 10 years.
Mrs Furlong and her husband Felix Furlong were married before the Second World War. Mr Furlong had to leave his wife alone, expecting their first child, while he served in the war in New Guinea.
The hardships and shortages of food and supplies once again had to be endured, but Mrs Furlong battled on over the years to raise a total of six children, Frances, Felix, Evan, Murray, Faith and Carmel.
Mrs Furlong, now known as Nanna Furlong, has 14 grandchildren and 27 great grandchildren. All are scattered around the country, as far away as Townsville, and Warrnambool, but she has two great-grandchildren as close as Ellinbank.
Her son Evan Furlong said his parents were “remarkable, although not showy people who had good morals and ethics”.
He said while there was not much money to go around (like lots of people at the time), there was lots of love, and somehow they managed to put all of their kids through private schools.
“That must’ve been very tough on them at the time,” he said.
During some school holidays, they took in children from the boys’ orphanage to give them a normal family life through school holidays. They also adopted a migrant from the Russian invasion of Hungary, a girl by the name of Elizabeth.
“When Mum’s mother (Nanna Garfield) grew old, Mum looked after her at home at the same time as looking after her sister - Auntie Lou.”
Mrs Furlong now lives with Evan in Warragul and is “very well”. Due to COVID, she celebrated her birthday with a very small gathering.