Julia Blakeney, a local resident in Bowie, Md. celebrated her 99th birthday Sept. 29.
Julia Blakeney
“It makes me feel good,” she said, referring to her birthday. “I feel the same, like I was when I was seventy-nine.”
Blakeney received congratulatory letters from President Barak Obama, Maryland Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley and several other politicians.
Her son, Dr. Theodore Blakeney Jr. will host a birthday celebration Oct. 5 for his mother at service at Mt. Carmel Baptist located at 901 3rd St in Northwest D.C. The celebration will follow the churches 10:10 a.m. service.
“I am who I am today, because of my mother,” he said.
Blakeney said she believes that it’s important “to always have faith in Jesus.”
Dedicated to her family, Blakeney said that she and her daughter share a very close relationship. “I treasure my daughter Gardenia, she shares the most with me,” she said.
Blakeney was born in Anderson, S.C. in 1915. In the early fifties, she, her husband Theodore Blakeney Sr., a pullman porter for the Pennsylvania and Long Island railroads and their five children moved to Washington D.C., where she worked at Sibley Hospital in Northwest.
Blakeney has been blessed with 12 grandchildren and multiple great grandchildren.
For more details on attending her birthday celebration, please contact the church at 202-842-341.1.