Jamaica Plain’s 107-year-old Julia Vega has died
Julia Vega, a Jamaica Plain resident and Puerto Rico native, died on Sunday. She was 107.
Vega was 103 years old, according to U.S. records, but her grandson Luis Vega, 40, said that was because the records kept in Vega Baja, Puerto Rico weren’t up to date. Instead, Vega and her family celebrated her birthday every year on her baptism date, which was May 10, 1908.
Vega lived in Vega Alta until her oldest son bought her a plane ticket 53 years ago. She lived in Boston ever since.
Vega lived with the youngest of her 14 children when she moved to Boston. Luis described her as a strong woman who had to raise her kids on her own when her husband died at a young age.
“She was the matriarch of the whole family, the rock that kept us all together,’’ he said.
The great-great-grandmother celebrated her most recent birthday on Mother’s Day with 50 of her relatives, according to The Boston Globe.
During the party, family described Vega as fiercely independent. She even washed all of her own clothes by hand because she didn’t believe a washer worked as well.
Family told the Globe that Vega credited her long life to working hard, staying away from drugs and alcohol, and eating healthy.
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