Nursing students Carly Morse and Mia Lopez, who are working part time at Langdon Place in Nashua, stopped by to wish Ruth Brown a happy 109th birthday on Wednesday.

Punch and snacks were being served, a giant sheet cake was being cut into modest-size slices and dozens of people were chatting and grabbing cell phone photos when two young women wearing big smiles under their masks sprang into the room clutching floral arrangements.

They made their way through the gathering and headed toward the spot where a woman several generations their elder sat alongside a table where the cake was on display, topped with shiny, red-colored plastic numerals spelling out a number that the vast majority of people will never get to see: “109.”

“Hi, Ruth. Happy birthday!” chirped one of the two young women, well aware that she needed to speak at full volumn if Ruth was to hear the greeting.

Ruth – born Ruth Anna Victoria Magnuson on June 15, 1913 – 109 years ago Wednesday, the day of her party – looked up and smiled broadly.

“Well thank you dear,” Ruth responded, as both young women set down the flowers they brought her and had a brief conversation.

Ruth Brown and her daughter, Bonnie Oliphant, listen to Mayor Jim Donchess read a proclamation of congratulations celebrating Brown's 109th birthday Wednesday at Langdon Place of Nashua.

Mia Lopez and Carly Morse, nursing students who had just graduated from Nashua High School North and have been working part time at Ruth’s home of several years, Langdon Place of Nashua, had the day off, but they knew they couldn’t miss stopping by for Ruth’s 109th birthday celebration.

“We love her,” Morse said later. “She’s a breath of fresh air … she never argues with us,” Lopez added with a laugh.

Indeed, smiles and laughs and hearty congratulations were abundant throughout the afternoon celebration, which a good number of Ruth’s fellow Langdon Place residents and the entire staff attended, along with Ruth’s surviving daughter, Bonnie Oliphant, and her husband.

Two special invited guests were also among the celebrants, one of whom, Mayor Jim Donchess, read a proclamation that highlighted the milestones and accomplishments Ruth has achieved over her remarkable life.

Also bringing birthday wishes was state Sen. Cindy Rosenwald, whose 13th district includes the part of Nashua where Langdon Place is located.

Langdon Place executive director Heather Davis MacNeil watches Ruth Brown cut the first slices from her giant birthday cake Wednesday, as a videographer captures the moment. Dozens of residents and guests turned out to wish Brown a happy 109th birthday.

Donchess, before reading the proclamation, introduced himself to Ruth, telling her “you look great.” “Well, I feel great,” she responded.

“So you’re the mayor? How do you like your job?” Ruth promptly asked Donchess. He replied with a smile and said he does.

Ruth’s longevity, and the fact that she’s remarkably healthy – her hearing is her only significant deficit – recently caught the attention of researchers from the New England Centenarian Study, a Boston University-affiliated program founded in 1995, and a related program, the Long Life Family Study, which has several study sites, one of which is Boston Medical Center.

Earlier this year, researchers came to Langdon to meet and interview Ruth, her daughter said. Things were going OK for awhile, but when they asked if they could take a blood sample to analyze and extract DNA as part of their research, things sort of went downhill.

“She wasn’t very enthused about that part at all,” her daughter Bonnie said. “She didn’t see the point of it.” But when she was told that she’d be contributing to scientific research that might help scientists learn new things about longevity, Ruth consented, albeit reluctantly.

Together, the twin research initiatives make up “the largest and most comprehensive study of centenarians and their families in the world,” according to information posted online.

The New England Centenarian Study states that it is “actively seeking people age 100-plus, their siblings, and their children” to participate in the study.

Anyone with a centenarian in their family can contact the study at 888-333-6327, and follow prompts to connect with a member of the research staff.

Those interested can also contact the study manager, Reena Karki, at reenakar@bu.edu, or the study’s principal investigator, Thomas Perls, at thperls@bu.edu.

There are an estimated 97,000 centenarians currently living in the United States, the highest number in the world, the study shows. Japan has the world’s highest rate of centenarians, who make up .06 percent of its population.

Locating actual lists of current living centenarians, and supercentenarians (age 110 and older), for the state, the region or the nation, proves a difficult task. So while there’s a good chance that Ruth is New Hampshire’s eldest resident, confirming it is another story.

As of last week, according to statistics listed by the study, the eldest living American-born person is Maria Branas Morera, who was born in San Francisco on March 4, 1907, making her 115 years and 102 days old. She later emigrated to Spain.

The oldest individual born, and still living, in the U.S. is Bessie Hendricks, born in Carroll County, Iowa, on Nov. 7, 1907 – when Morera was 8 months old.

Ruth, meanwhile, was born in McKeesport, Pennsylvania, today a town of about 20,000 people about 15 miles southeast of Pittsburgh. Her father, a Swedish immigrant, moved there in 1902 to work in the Pittsburgh area steel mills. He and Ruth’s mother married in 1912.

Ruth was born a year later, the first of 10 children to be born over the course of 13 1/2 years. Ruth has outlived all her siblings; her last sibling – her youngest brother – died in December 2020 at age 94.

For perspective, World War I was still about a year into the future when Ruth was born. Also born that year were former presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, and legendary NFL coach Vince Lombardi.

The 16th amendment to the Constitution was ratified in 1913, so it can be said that Ruth and the federal income tax made their debut together.

Nobody asked Ruth her thoughts about arriving with the new law that would spawn the Internal Revenue Service, but legend has it she is frequently asked a variation of, “what is your secret for living such a long life?”

The answer hasn’t varied in years. “I can’t tell you,” she says with a smile. “Then it wouldn’t be a secret.”

Dean Shalhoup’s column appears weekly in The Sunday Telegraph. He may be reached at 594-1256 or dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.