AN ISLE of Wight resident celebrated turning 101 in the company of care workers in Totland Bay on Wednesday.

Lilian Leader, who lives at Totland’s Little Hayes Residential Home, was one of ten children.

She attended the south-east London based King and Queen Street school in Walworth, excelling in both English and history.

In common with some of her older sisters, from age 14 she assisted her father, Richard, with his floristry business in East Lane Market in Walworth.

Born in 1918, Lilian remained active by playing netball, and swimming at the local baths, where she would often spend afternoons completing lengths as part of a fitness regime that kept her in rude health.

She married George in March, 1940, with their daughter Patricia born two years later, and son Dennis in 1950, and considered her family her proudest accomplishment.

George died in 2001, and Patricia in December 2017. Lilian has two grandchildren, Glen, 43, who lives in Southampton and David, 35, who lives in Worthing.

In the 1970s and 1980s Lilian worked as a microfilm photo printer at the Public Records Office in Chancery Lane. Her work included copying the Domesday Book to microfilm.

Lilian learnt to drive in 1969 when in her 50s, and took a job with a local publishing company until she retired in 1978.

Relocating to Brighstone in 1999, Lilian stayed with Patricia and her husband Des for ten years before going to Seven Gables Residential Home in Totland. She relocated to nearby Little Hayes in 2016.

Lilian’s son Dennis recalls his mother’s resolve, he said: “She strived to provide a better life for her children, epitomised by saving money for the deposit on the first home my parents owned in 1958. She has been a devoted and loving mother throughout her life.”