Granny Woggie celebrates 100 years of life
Winton Park centenarian, Margaret Acutt reminisces on memorable life journey.
MARGARET Acutt (nee Bowley) who turned a 100 on Wednesday, March 2 attributes her long life to good genes and exercise.
Swimming and regular exercise has helped Acutt, fondly known as ‘Granny Woggie’, stay healthy and fit for her age.
“I also enjoy a sundowner every afternoon,” she smiled.
She said she was born in 1922 in Johannesburg during the miners’ strike.
As a child, she lived in various places around Johannesburg, from Belgravia to Boksburg and then Germiston. She attended local schools until she went to St Annes at Hilton in 1933. She enjoyed reading, playing tennis, hiking and socialising with her friends.
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She remembers the family owning a motor bike and side car before they bought a car.
Acutt said she also fondly remembers going on picnics and her mother sitting on the pillion seat while she was in the side car with Spotty, the dog, and the picnic basket.
Remarkably, when they bought their first car, Acutt taught her mother to drive by telling her what her father did.
Acutt said she left school at the end of 1939 and after a year at Wits University in 1940, she started her Nursing Training at the Johannesburg Hospital in 1941. Here she also made great friends and when they finished their training they joined the Army Nursing Service.
After the war she continued nursing in Pietermaritzburg and then in Durban for the Health Service until early in 1947 when she married Michael Acutt and went to live in the Balgowan area.
“I started working at Clifton School at Nottingham Road in 1956 and retired at the end of 1983 when I moved to Kloof where I went to work at the Kloof Library.
She has always been an avid reader so this was an ideal job for her.
“That was the job I should have done, I truly enjoyed it,” she said.
According to Acutt, she retired from the library in 2008 although she continued helping the librarians on a part time basis until about 2015. It was at the library and in Kloof where she made many more good friends.
She has two children, John and Barbara, and four grandchildren, Heather, Bryan, Morgan and Lauryn. She takes great pride in the success of her grandchildren and has such affection for them all. Her great grandchildren, Ben, Ella, Isla and Clara, are also important to her and she looks forward to their visits.
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“I now live comfortably and well looked after at The Palms Rest Home in Winston Park. I am still an avid reader of books as well as the daily and weekly newspapers and follows the news at large with keen interest,” she said.
She celebrated her birthday surrounded by close friends, family and the home’s residents. The home was beautifully decorated with white and gold.
The independent lady was very taken and impressed with the decoration and the cake, “It is gorgeous, lovely. I am so happy, everything is beautiful,” said Acutt with a smile.
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