Last year, Hazel Josephine “Jo” Briant celebrated her 100th birthday. Sapulpa Times was there to cover the event, and it was amazing how she came waltzing into the birthday party, her spunky movement belying her triple-digit age. This year, as Jo Briant celebrates her 101st birthday, there’s no party, but there’s a celebration of a life that has been well-lived and rewarded.
Hazel Josephine Banister was born July 17th, 1919, a farmer’s daughter, and at 16, married David Briant and became a farmer’s wife. David Briant passed away in 1995.
In an interview with Sapulpa Times on her birthday, she recounted how times have changed since she was a girl in Ray County, Missouri, where she sold eggs to buy their first washing machine or had to use a party-line telephone to make a phone call (her daughter told us “our phone number was two shorts and a long.”) Her first sewing machine was hand-cranked, and her dad drove a “Model-A” car. She never had a television until she was in her 30s.
Jo loves country-western music, especially Dolly Parton, and reads Danielle Steele. A renowned seamstress and tailor, she’s won many awards in county and state fairs for her rugs, quilts, and beadwork.
Jo never smoked and never drank, but says there’s no real secret to her long life, except to “stay busy.”
