As she closes in on her 100th birthday, Grace Engesser Paquette’s secret to longevity in life can’t really be attributed to one particular thing. Instead she feels its a variety of factors that have come into play.
“I’ve thought a lot about that lately and I just think life was just so much simpler and things were much easier when I was growing up which really helped,” Grace said. “When we were kids growing up on the farm we didn’t have all these fertilizers and chemicals they use today. We grew everything we ate. We raised our own vegetables and had a orchard for fruit and also raised livestock for meat. My mother always made sure we ate a very balanced diet and I’ve passed that on to my own children as well.
“Children these days seem to have to be so driven and many don’t really get a chance to be kids.
“I also think I’ve been fortunate to have some pretty good family genes. There are several people in my family who have lived a long time and I’m happy to keep up the family tradition,” she quipped.
Grace, who lived on her own and drove her own car up until around age 98, will mark her reaching centenarian status (her birthday is April 30) amongst family and friends who will be on hand at a private birthday party at the St. Peter Community on Sunday. She also has already been receiving cards and well wishes at her residence at the Benedictine Living Community of St. Peter.
“It sounds like a lot of my family will be there, so I’m really looking forward to getting together with everyone,” Grace said.
In November 2009, there were some concerns about Grace making it to see 100. She went through some serious health issues at that time when an aneurysm was discovered in the main artery of her abdomen that was deemed life threatening.
Doctors down in Rochester originally thought because of her age that surgery to repair the aneurysm wasn’t an option, but a check on her heart determined it was plenty strong so the operation went forward.
“It was amazing because they said she had a heart like a 40-year old woman and she came through it like a breeze,” Grace’s daughter Diane Braun said. “She was back at home a short time later and is recovering well.”
Grace’s life started on a farm in New Sweden Township where she was the third oldest out of Gerhard and Marie Swenson’s 10 children they raised on their farm. She attended country school, “which was a mile away if you walked across the field,” until the eighth grade and then moved on to St. Peter High School.
Back then there was no public transportation for students so she worked for room and board with a family in town who operated a grocery store on the south end of St. Peter. She would eventually graduate in 1928 and it was during those times living and working at that grocery store where she caught the eye of a young man named Harold Engesser who she eventually married at age 18.
“Harold, who was seven years older than me, worked with his brother George in their circus and when he’d come back for about three months during the winter he’d stay with his family who lived near the store where I worked,” Grace said. “He’d come in from time to time and we got to know each other very well and started dating. The fall after I graduated from high school (in 1928) we got married.”
Grace would join Harold on the road with the Engesser family’s circus for the next few years, which was a lifestyle she really got to enjoy.
“I had never even been out of state until I married Harold,” Grace said. “It was a great way to see the country. During those years with the circus, we traveled to every state west of the Mississippi and many states out east, including all of them in the southeast part of the country.
“It was a real exciting time for me, especially since every place we went was someplace new and while it was a lot of hard work it was a lot of fun.”
But, eventually the Great Depression also took its toll on the circus business and the Engessers closed down and Harold and Grace moved back to St. Peter to be close to family.
“We lived with some of his relatives of his for a little while before moving into an apartment above his parents’ house where we lived for 19 years,” Grace said.
The couple both eventually got jobs working at the State Hospital where they both worked for 30-plus years. Harold passed away in 1967 shortly after he retired from his career at the State Hospital.
Prior to Harold’s death, the Engessers raised their three children, Harold, Jr., Vonnie and Diane, here in St. Peter. Two of them, Harold and Diane, reside here in St. Peter while Vonnie resides in the St. Cloud area.
Altogether, Grace’s family tree includes 12 grandchildren, 26 great-grandchildren and 9 great-great grandchildren with two more set to arrive soon.
Grace remarried in 1974 to Ernest Paquette, shortly after she retired from the State Hospital and they stayed together until Ernest passed away in 1987. Ernest, who also worked at the State Hospital where the two of them met, did not have any children prior to their marriage. |
