GRANDMOTHER Edith Hilton has celebrated her 100th birthday.

The lifelong York resident, who currently lives at Oliver House residential home on Bishophill Junior in the city centre, celebrated the milestone with family and friends at a party in Acomb yesterday.

She was born Edith Burdett on July 11, 1910, at a house in Leeman Road and was the eldest of six siblings, all of whom she has outlived, apart from her youngest sister, Molly, who is 88.

Her first job was as a maid for a doctor in Acomb Road, but she soon left his household to work at Terry’s chocolate factory on its old site in Skeldergate.

She married Charles Hilton, who served in the Royal Artillery and fought in North Africa during the Second World War.

The couple had a son John, who was born in 1945.

Mrs Hilton was widowed on July 9, 1984, the same day York Minster caught fire.

She has two grandsons, Adam, 37, and Peter, 34, and one great-grandchild, three-year-old Freya.

Daughter-in-law Jenny Hilton said: “Edith is always smiling and has an easy-going and pleasant nature. She also enjoys a glass of sherry, which is her secret to a long life.”