Sussex great grandma Gladys Beadle celebrates turning 100

Gladys Beadle was born in Portslade in 1920 and has lived in the same bungalow in Southwick since she moved into it in 1939.

Her daughter Sue Groves, 72, said: “Mum never smoked or drank and she’s always been hardworking. She still cooks her own meals and she loves her bungalow.

“She had a fall a few years ago but before that I can never remember her being ill – she got over pneumonia in a few weeks.

"She’s been a wonderful grandmother and great-grandmother and she’s a very caring lady. She would always help someone if she could.”

At 14, Gladys started work at a wool shop in Boundary Road, before moving to a chocolate shop near Palmeira Square in Hove.

Sue, who lives in Southwick, said: “Mum always wanted to work at Flynn’s Cleaners in Fishersgate – and that’s exactly what she did until she got married. She loved it.”

After getting married to Frank Beadle, an electrical foreman at the old gasworks in Portslade in 1939, Gladys had her first child, Alan, in 1940. Gladys initially had to raise him alone while Frank was away serving with the British Army in the Second World War.

Gladys on her wedding day in 1939

Sue, who was born in 1947, said: “When we were young my parents did an awful lot for Southwick Football Club.

“My mum used to wash all the kits and I can remember our bath being full of muddy water while they soaked. She did a lot of cleaning down the club and my dad put up the first set of floodlights.”

Sue and Alan had arranged a birthday party at Shoreham Airport but have changed plans because of the coronavirus crisis.

Sue said: “We’re going to keep to the guidelines and have a socially distant party in her garden. You can’t do much else but you can’t let it go –it’s quite an achievement. Not everyone gets to 100.”