Gladys Hooper

Gladys Hooper (née Nash, born 18 January 1903) is an English supercentenarian who became the oldest living person in the United Kingdom after the death of Ethel Lang on 15 January 2015.^[1]

Early life

Hooper was born on 18 January, 1903 in Dulwich.^[2] In 1916, she witnessed the German airship Schütte-Lanz SL 11 being shot down by Leefe Robinson, who was later awarded the Victoria Cross for his actions.^[3] Hooper also met Thomas Edison, co-inventor of the lightbulb, when he visited her school.^[4] Hooper went to college with aviator Amy Johnson, the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia, they became friends, with Hooper saying "She was good fun and a very good friend". Hooper was also a concert pianist, and played with famous bandleaders such as Jack Payne, Debroy Somers and Maurice Winnick.^[5]

In 1922, Gladys married Leslie Hooper, who had been a pilot in the Royal Flying Corps during the First World War. The couple had one child, a son called Derek, who later became a pilot.

Later life

Hooper's husband Leslie died in 1977, after battling Parkinson's disease. She moved to Sandown on the Isle of Wight in 1979, to be closer to her family.^[6] She lived independently until the age of 101, when she moved to the town of Ryde, also on the Isle of Wight, to live with her son Derek. Hooper has outlived all of her siblings after her last, and youngest sibling Joyce died in 2014, aged 92.

References

External links

• Validated Living Supercentenarians