via Cleveland19:
Annie Bell Carter quit school to pick cotton, got married when she was 15-years-old and moved from the South to Cleveland to keep her family safe.
Born Aug. 9, 1914, or 1913, depending on who you ask, Carter celebrated her 104th birthday Sunday afternoon, Aug 12 in the basement hall at Zion Hill Missionary Church on Kinsman Rd. in Cleveland.
“She’s just a beautiful hard-working woman, a church going woman, that’s all I can say,” Carter’s oldest daughter Annie Marie Lawson, 87, said about her mother. Asked about her longevity Lawson said her mother’s secret is “her belief in the Lord.”
A long-time resident of Cleveland and member of Zion Hill Missionary Baptist Church Carter raised her eight children in Cleveland as a single mother. Today Carter has over 125 grand-children, great-grandchildren and great great-grandchildren.
“She’s been an inspiration for me,” Rev. Jimmy L. Gates, Zion Hill Baptist Church, said about guest of honor Sunday afternoon.
Carter, whose husband was shot to death in 1953, raised eight children working for the Cleveland Board of Education and the Cleveland School of the Arts. Carter retired in 1988.
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LOCAL NEWS: Cleveland Centenarian Has Lived An ‘Inspirational’ Life was originally published on praisecleveland.com
