Few can say they’ve lived to celebrate their 100th birthday.

Even fewer can say they’ve hit that milestone while still sharp and spry enough to maintain their driver’s license.

Florence Feldmeier is lucky enough to count herself among those select few.

Feldmeier grew up on a farm near Maeystown and has always stayed local, though she currently makes her home on the opposite side of the small village.

She grew up on a farm that had been in the family for four generations, living alongside three brothers and her sister, each of whom she has managed to outlive even as she’s faced her fair share of difficulties.

“I just outlived everybody, just everybody,” Feldmeier said. “Which I really didn’t think I would, but I sure pulled through all my problems, surgeries.”

Feldmeier recalled a range of livestock on the family farm, including horses, cows and pigs. Her father also grew corn, and her mother did a lot of canning as well as cooking and baking.

As a young girl, she kept busy studying at school on top of her responsibilities at home. She said milking the cows was a particularly big job for her. Off the farm, she also volunteered at church to pump the organ for music during services.

She happily stayed on the farm as she got older, and it was her plan to remain there indefinitely. Feldmeier noted she still loves farming and is pleased that her niece now continues to operate the family farm.

Fate had different plans for Feldmeier besides just staying on the farm, however, as she was presented with an opportunity through staying with and caring for some friends who were homebound following a bad vehicle accident.

A relative that visited them happened to be the manager of Lemay Bank – now Midwest BankCentre – in St. Louis, and he asked her what she planned to do with herself as her friends were recovered.

“I said, ‘Go home with my mom and stay on the farm,’” Feldmeier said. “I didn’t want to go to work! And so he says, ‘Why don’t you come and work at the bank?’”

Though she argued that her skills with a typewriter and calculator were bound to be rusty, he persisted, training her and putting her to work. She spoke very highly of him as a boss.

Feldmeier worked there for 44 years, retiring at the age of 71 as she made plenty of friends over the years and had a number of celebrations as she reached her retirement.

Work for Feldmeier has always been a pleasure, whether it was at the bank or the several organizations she volunteered with over the years.

“I enjoy everything I ever did,” Feldmeier said. “Everybody says ‘Oh, don’t you hate going to work?’ I had not one day that I hated to go to work. Never. And I did so much volunteer work.”

She specifically recalled volunteering with the Waterloo VFW Auxiliary, serving as a member for over 55 years and scarcely missing a day of work until she ran into some health issues recently.

Feldmeier and her sister also came together to volunteer with the American Legion Auxiliary, and she noted all the weddings she helped host over the years as well as the good food that was served.

Even at her age, Feldmeier is keen to keep herself busy with this sort of work, though the COVID-19 pandemic over the past few years along with a health scare or two in that time has kept her from doing so. 

She still manages to stay occupied nevertheless.

“I’d love to go back to work. I really would,” Feldmeier said. “If I could walk around better, I would go back to volunteering. Not a job, but just volunteering. I sure would. I just love to work, and I just love to keep my house clean.”

Currently, Feldmeier said she often fills her days with word searches, solitaire and dominoes, also tending to the house or spending time out amid the garden that’s cared for by her neighbors.

For the longest time, a major passion of hers was dance. She developed her skills and interest in that area thanks to all the waltzes, square dances and such she participated in when she was younger.

“I love to dance. I was a dancer!” Feldmeier said. “Oh man, I loved to dance. And I danced up until one time I just couldn’t do it. It seemed like my heart was acting up or something… But yes, I was a good dancer. My mom and dad were too.”

As previously mentioned, she’s also been able to keep herself plenty sharp, even renewing her driver’s license in just the past month.

“I just made up my mind that Thursday morning at the end of June that I’m gonna go get my driver’s license, and that’s what I did,” Feldmeier said. “Got in there, drove up there, passed the test and came home.”

Speaking more generally about her many years of life, Feldmeier pointed to some of the changes she’s seen, from growing up without electricity and watching her dad farm with a horse-drawn plow to living in a world of tractors, air conditioning and heaters.

She was generally pleased with the greater degree of convenience in the modern world, though she also bemoaned how bills and shopping expenses have increased even as she’s more or less always been able to keep up over the years.

Feldmeier recently celebrated her 100th birthday surrounded by friends and family, with the event planned by her niece Carla Feldmeier.

“It was just perfect,” Florence said. “She does everything perfect. She don’t do nothing halfway.”

Given the passion she showed in organizing her aunt’s birthday, it’s not surprising Carla had plenty of good things to say about her.

“She’s the embodiment of positivity and joy,” Carla said. “She’s always bringing smiles to our faces, and you can see when you look at her the happiness that she has when she looks at you. It’s like her family is her greatest treasure, and the dedication to all of us is unwavering.”

She praised Florence for her focus on community and family, her willingness to lend a helping hand all through her life and the way she’s managed to stay sharp at her age.

Carla also spoke to Florence’s good nature and interest in games.

“As children, she would always be the one that would play games with us, dominoes,” Carla said. “And I guess that’s where that comes from where she really likes dominoes now. You can just see that dominoes and card games, they’re infectious, and I guess it brings out the inner child in all of us. She loves to play, and I think that probably keeps her mind going.”

Her neighbor Judy Edler also had kind words to share on Florence, recalling the speech she shared at her friend’s recent birthday party.

“I’m so happy to have been a part of this young lady’s life,” Edler said. “She is quite an example for all of us, always happy, positive and reminds me to count my blessings.”

Edler also spoke to their shared love of flowers and, like Carla, commended her character and wits.

“She’s just an amazing woman,” Edler said. “You would never think that she’s 100 years old. She’s simply amazing and a very good person.”

Janeth Mogg has been a friend of Florence’s for some time thanks to their shared time at the VFW.

She noted how pleasant it was to work alongside Florence as well as the energy she put into all of her volunteer work.

“She’s very easy to work with,” Mogg said. “She wants to make sure everyone’s taken care of, and we tried to take care of her also because she’s the best to work with.”

Linda Tivener is another friend of Florence’s, the two having gotten to know one another through their time working at the bank.

Tivener expressed her thanks to Florence as she served as a great mentor, though the two are also exceptional friends even with a bit of an age gap.

“Very soft-mannered, well-mannered,” Tivener said. “Just a very hard-working, just a wonderful person. There’s nothing fake about her. And I’ve never heard her say anything bad about people unless they deserved it.”

As she herself looks forward to the future, Florence offered a bit of advice for those to age with as much grace as she has.

“My biggest is working hard and going to the chiropractor,” Florence said. “That’s what keeps me going. And people have got to get moving. There are times where I almost have 5,000 steps!”