Always an elegant dresser, Juanita Mitchell wore a stylish, wide-brimmed hat Monday as Flossmoor commemorated her 105th birthday.
Friends and family watched as Mayor Paul Braun read a resolution honoring Mitchell for a long and productive lifetime during which she has “earned the respect and admiration of people from all walks of life.”
at the Flossmoor Board of Trustees meeting Feb. 6, where
she was honored on the occasion of her 105th birthday.
(Photo by Tom Houlihan/H-F Chronicle)
The resolution was the first item of business at the Feb. 6 village board meeting.
Braun knelt down next to Mitchell and started with a joke: “You don’t look a day over 100.”
Audience members laughed and he proceeded with the resolution, which pointed out her years of service in Chicago and Flossmoor, where she’s lived for the last 20 years.
When Braun finished, Mitchell offered her own comments.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you to each and every one of you,” she said. “Thank you to God for having blessed me all these years.”
Mitchell also thanked her daughter, Mary Muse, for “keeping me safe and sound all these years.”
“You’ve been a godsend to me,” she said.
After that, everyone in the council chambers broke into applause.
Braun said Flossmoor had also marked Mitchell’s 95th and 100th birthdays with resolutions.
“We look forward to seeing you back in five short years,” he said.
The resolution described Mitchell’s life as a wife and mother involved in school and civic life, served as a voting registrar and, in Flossmoor, was active in the Ballantrae Community Association and the village’s Beautification Committee.
Mitchell, the resolution states, has been a “powerful influence on her family and neighborhood community.”
The Homewood-Flossmoor Chronicle published a story on Mitchell shortly after her 105th birthday on Dec. 15.