Carmel woman to celebrate 100th birthday

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So, what is the secret to Ruth O’Banion’s longevity?

“Meanness, I think,” O’Banion said jokingly.

O’Banion, who lives in Majestic Care of Carmel, will turn 100 on Nov. 27. Her family will hold a party for her that day.

Laura McConnell said she attributes her mother’s longevity to “no drinking, no smoking, no fun.”

O’Banion does like to play bingo at Majestic Care two or three times a week. She also is an avid reader, with her favorite author being Danielle Steel. In addition, she enjoys sewing and visiting garage sales.

O’Banion moved from Loogotee to Indianapolis as a youngster during the Great Depression.

“My father was a builder, and he thought he could get a better position here,” said O’Banion, who graduated from Arsenal Tech High School.

She married Robert O’Banion around the start of World War II. O’Banion had five children, three who are still living. She worked before she had children as a bookkeeper and then went back to work in that capacity when her youngest child, Laura McConnell, was in fourth grade.

Her husband, Robert O’Banion, died at age 64 in 1985. She lost two children to cancer. Her son, Tim O’Banion, died at age 60 in 2013, and her daughter, Trish Erwin, died at age 54 in 2014.

O’Banion was the part-time bookkeeper for Doyle Furniture Co. in Nora for 50 years.

She finally retired at age 83 from being a bookkeeper at Keep Indianapolis Beautiful.

McConnell and her sisters, Kathy and Char, live in Carmel. Tim’s wife, Jennifer “Jeffie” Tupper, who lives in Hilton Head, S.C., is helping to throw the party.

O’Banion has 11 grandchildren and 17 great-grandchildren.

“I think they are all going to be there,” she said.


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