12144: Matriarch Henriette Bolane Dies At Age 111 (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: JHUDICOURTB@aol.com

      Matriarch Henriette Bolane Dies At Age 111

      By Adam Bernstein
      Washington Post Staff Writer
      Thursday, May 23, 2002; Page B07


      Henriette Desravine Bolane, 111, a spry Haitian native who in 1996
reportedly became the oldest naturalized U.S. citizen on record, danced the
merengue till the wee hours on her 100th birthday, became a Baptist at 102
and was a baby-sitting legend in the Haitian community, died May 19 at Laurel
Regional Hospital. She had sepsis.

      Mrs. Bolane, who lived in Laurel with a daughter, was "Maman Yeyette"
to the dozens of children she had cared for since coming to Washington from
Haiti in 1971. Her petite, 5-foot frame was capped by curly white hair, and
she was known for a gentle smile and demeanor. News reports in recent years
remarked at how smooth her skin was, how clear her brown eyes were.

      She attributed her youthfulness to watching heart-racing strangleholds
and other crazy contortions performed on television professional wrestling
programs.

      The average life expectancy in Haiti, depending on the source, is in
the fifties. Her lifespan in a nation of great poverty, malnutrition and
disease -- not to mention the vicious Tontons Macoute, the secret police of
the Duvalier dictatorships -- was remarkable.

      But one of Mrs. Bolane's grandsons once told The Washington Post that
she was not superhuman. "Ever since she hit 104, her body started slowing
down," he said.

      Mrs. Bolane was born to a farming family near Port-au-Prince in 1890 --
the same year as Dwight D. Eisenhower's birth -- and spent much of her life
on a farm she owned and operated with her husband. They raised corn,
avocados, rice, coffee, tobacco and livestock in a mountainous region called
Petite Rivier de Nips.

      She also raised eight children, the last of which she had at age 54.
She had exhibited rare independence in her day by choosing her husband as
opposed to the standard custom of an arranged union.

      She saw a life of turmoil in Haiti. The nation had more than 30 rulers
between the 1840s and 1910s. Improvements in infrastructure were made over
the next 20 years after U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sent in troops to quell
restiveness in 1915.

      Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier was elected president in 1957, assuming
dictatorial powers in 1964. That was followed by the reign of his son,
Jean-Claude, beginning in 1971.

      Mrs. Bolane's family started immigrating to the United States after
Papa Doc's ascension. She came to the Washington area in 1971.

      Her life in the United States was child-, grandchild-,
great-grandchild- and great-great-grandchild-centered. Word spread through
the Haitian community of her skill with children, and she was called on to
baby-sit for youngsters.

      She regaled them with tales of the changes she had seen. She was 13 the
year Henry Ford started his motor company and the Wright brothers made the
first sustained, controlled flight in a powered aircraft at Kitty Hawk, N.C.
-- both in 1903.

      "My father's friends used to come over to our house and tell stories of
how someday there would be vehicles in the sky and vehicles rolling on the
ground," she said in Creole, which was translated into English for a reporter.

      "And years later, there were the first planes, and my father heard the
noise in the sky and thought it was thunder," she said. "I said, 'No, it's a
plane. Oh, this time I know better than you!' "

      She became a U.S. citizen in 1996, a month before her 106th birthday.
Her family prompted her to take the oath, concerned that newly signed welfare
legislation would eliminate some benefits even to legal immigrants.

      Many requirements of citizenship were waived, and the director of the
Immigration and Naturalization Service's Maryland office came to her home to
administer her oath personally. She had never become fluent in English, and
the oath was translated into Creole for her.

      She interrupted her citizenship oath once, when the INS director spoke
about her obligation to "bear arms on behalf of the United States."

      "I'm too old," Mrs. Bolane said. "I can't do anything for anybody.
People have to do things for me now."

      She spent much of her time at church and converted from Roman Catholic
to Baptist after two of her children had done the same. She attended Our Lady
of Sorrows Catholic Church in Takoma Park and then L'eglise de Dieu, a
Haitian Baptist church in Silver Spring.

      Her husband, Philogene Boland, whom she married in 1925, died in 1963.
Two daughters from a previous relationship also died, Isma Dorisca in 1946
and Marie Claire Vielot in March. A son from her marriage, Nelio Bolane, died
in 1955.

      Survivors include four children from her marriage, Lauvanne Zephirin of
Hyattsville, Clementine Guelce of Laurel and Amela Lemaire and Morilan
Bolane, both of Takoma Park; a son from a previous relationship, Luc Dorisca
of Haiti; 27 grandchildren; 42 great-grandchildren; and a
great-great-granddaughter.


      © 2002 The Washington Post Company