White and purple balloons, pictures, and flowers decorated the auditorium inside Cornerstone Retirement Community, as family, friends and caretakers gathered to celebrate a very special day.
Cornerstone’s oldest resident, Helen Powell, celebrated her 105th birthday at Cornerstone Tuesday, surrounded by friends and family.
Born in Texarkana, Texas and a graduate from Texarkana High School, Helen Powell is both the oldest resident currently living in the community, and also the resident who has lived the longest at Cornerstone.
She is a cancer survivor and says she doesn’t have a secret of longevity. According to her caretakers, she gives no credit to a special diet or a rigorous exercise regimen. On the contrary, Mrs. Powell loves candy, so much in fact that her party featured a table full of delicious sweets.
According to her only child, Don Cox, Powell enjoyed to dance in her younger years. “She loved to dance, she and my dad were quite the dancers,” said Cox.
Powell’s son stood next to her as attendee’s sang the happy birthday song in unison, moments after he bent over and gave his mother and “birthday girl” a kiss.
“She is the most beautiful woman, inside and out. We had some pretty tough times, but she never missed a beat. She went to work and took care of me. She’s been the best mother in the whole wide world, and I am so blessed to have her, I really am,” expressed Powell’s 82-year-old son, Don Cox.
