Irma Donnis turns 100, receives Boston Post Gold Cane for being oldest Hatfield resident
Published: 01-29-2025 10:30 AM
Modified: 01-29-2025 4:23 PM |
HATFIELD — Even to this day, more than 70 years after arriving in New England following her marriage to a Hatfield man, a trace of a Southern accent can still be heard as Irma Donnis reflects on her childhood in Kentucky and her formative years in southern Ohio.
When she got to Hatfield with husband Bernard Donnis, though, she took to the local Polish customs in town, including learning to make good sauerkraut.
“I like good Polish food,” Donnis says.
As Donnis turned 100 years old on Tuesday, she is earning recognition from the community, including being presented with the Boston Post Golden Cane, which she got to hold for a few hours and which cites her as the oldest town resident. She also received a certificate signed by members of the Select Board, and will have her name added to a plaque at the Council on Aging, located at Memorial Town Hall.
While achieving the milestone, more important to her are the visits from her family, including her sons, William Donnis, up from Alexandria, Virginia, and David Donnis and Paul Donnis, both of Hatfield.
“It’s been a great life, I had a great husband and great kids,” Donnis said. “I’ve had a good family.”
All told, though her husband died in 2014 and her only daughter, Joan Mullins, of Turners Falls, died in 2021, nearly 30 family members came to her birthday party, including seven grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren, with one more due in March. She enjoyed a cake in the shape of the number 100, a sash she could wear and a banner hanging over the kitchen table. The real gift for her was the presence of her family.
As a child, her father always ran a general store and the family later moved to Portsmouth, Ohio. “When they had floods, they really had floods,” Donnis said.
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During World War II, Paul Donnis explained she worked for the Commerce Department, keeping track of warships as they sailed overseas.
“My boss was Capt. Jones, he told us a lot of stories of being on the ocean and experiences they had,” Donnis said.
She worked there until 1948, and was present in the nation’s capital for the 1945 death of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt that shocked the nation. “She always spoke about the friends she had there,” David Donnis said.
It was also there that she met her husband, whose family ran Donnis Lumber Co., Inc. next to the Elm Street home where she still lives. Her children recall how shavings from the wood were bagged in burlap bags and she would sew the bags closed and then sell them to Agway and University of Massachusetts for bedding. The money made helped pay for a swimming pool and resurfacing the driveway.
Always a homemaker after her wedding, Donnis had expertise in caring for plants and making sure her home looked presentable.
“She would get down on her hands and knees, she always had a nice yard,” David Donnis said. “That was her whole life — the yard.”
With more family still to come to offer her well wishes, including from New Hampshire and Maryland, and a niece doing genealogical research that will lead to a book about her life, members of the First Congregational Church sang happy birthday to Donnis at Sunday’s service, which she was able to livestream, and the minister wished her a happy birthday, as well.
William Donnis laughed that a few days before the celebration, he asked his mother how old she would be, and when she feigned not knowing, he told her she would be 100.
“Wow, I’m really getting up there,” she replied.
Donnis said comforts in her life include “good ice cream, good steak and a good night’s rest,” adding that “I love my family, I wish them a long life and hope the grandchildren grow up so I can be proud of them.”
Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.