May 11th, Grace DiGiovanni celebrates her 106th birthday. Surrounded by over 100 friends and relatives, a party will be held at Otterbein Lebanon Senior Lifestyle Community in her honor. DiGiovanni was born on May 11, 1907 to Lena and Tony Danna, both Italian immigrants who came to the U.S. through Ellis Island. The eldest of 10 children, she grew up in Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan where she worked at a hardware store in her younger years. In the 1930s, she married her late husband, Michael DiGiovanni, with whom she had two children, Jimmy and Marie. During this time, she worked as a nursery aide at a hospital.
In 1907, the year that Grace was born, Theodore Roosevelt was president. Grace also was born in the same year that the electric light bulb was invented. The average cost of a dozen eggs was 14 cents, and a pound of sugar cost four cents a pound. In 1907 the American flag only had 45 stars. Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona, Alaska, and Hawaii were all admitted after Grace was born.
Grace is a devoted and respected member of her family. Today her family includes her stepdaughter who lives in Florida, three grandchildren, seven great-grandchildren, 24 great-grandnieces and nephews and 23 great-great-grandnieces and nephews.
About Otterbein Lebanon Senior Lifestyle Community
Otterbein Lebanon Senior Lifestyle Community is part of Otterbein Senior Lifestyle Choices, a non-profit health and human service ministry, serving nearly 3,000 people, and is related to the East Ohio and West Ohio Conferences of the United Methodist Church. The full-service CCCR offers a wide variety of apartments, patio homes and ranch homes with many on-site services and amenities, including a life enrichment center with programs by the Countryside YMCA, on-campus security, emergency call system, extensive programs department and transportation. Also, skilled nursing, assisted living, rehabilitation, respite care, memory services, home health, adult day services and wellness services. Offering hospice starting in 2013.
