Having one person in a country town reach the century milestone is impressive but when there are two on the same day, who happen to be neighbours, that’s a feat worth celebrating.

Cooma residents and neighbours, Heather Little and Eileen Tindall turned 100 last week. The pair was joined by family and friends on Thursday 3 September for a party in their street, with a special appearance from Howard Charles OAM who dressed as King Charles.

King Charles presented Heather and Eileen with their letters from the King and member of parliament.

Heather and Eileen are well-known Monaro residents, having dedicated much of their lives to community service.

Eileen has lived on the Monaro her entire life, all within a 35km radius of Cooma. She grew up near Rock Flat and lived near Nimmitabel for 55 years before moving to Cooma 20 years ago.

Heather jokes when she says Eileen is the real local.

“I’ve only lived in Cooma for 76 years,” Heather said

Heather has embedded herself within the local community for all those decades and has helped build and support the town’s local services. Indeed, it is impressive that Heather - at 100 years of age - is still contributing at meetings of a range of community groups including the CWA, Probus and the War Widows Guild.

“It’s just a natural thing to be part of community. I was a member of CWA in Warragamba Dam before Nat (her late husband) and I moved to Cooma in 1950 with the Snowy Scheme,” Heather said.

“So the local CWA group here welcomed me when we came down. And I’ve been an active member till now, except for the years I was working as a lab assistant at the high school.”

Heather also particularly enjoyed her work as hospital auxiliary ‘Pink Lady’ at Cooma Hospital, where she was one of two pink ladies to be given the RSL’s community ‘ANZACs of the year’ award for their work supporting patients.

“We would just do those little things like put all their flowers in water or sorting the laundry of, particularly, say, the single males who got sick working or holidaying in the mountains and who didn’t have someone to look after them,” Heather said.

But possibly one of her most enduring community contributions has been setting up the first pre-school in Cooma, which last year celebrated its 75th anniversary.

“As a young mother whose oldest child had benefited from a pre-school in Warragamba, I saw the need for one in Cooma. So I asked the mayor if he would put an ad in the paper to see if we could fine anybody interested in helping.

“The main response was from mothers in Cooma North, so that is where we started the first preschool. Then, later on, the Lions Club started the one in Cooma.”

In recognition of her community work, Heather won the Monaro electorate Local Woman of the Year Award in 2005.

Heather said the secret to reaching 100 are keeping physically and mentally active.

Heather has also played tennis from 10 years-of-age right through her adulthood, only giving it up at the age of 94 saying, ‘It’s not fair to the younger players as she can’t run fast enough to give them a good game’.

Eileen’s parents were Tom and Emma Stokes of ‘Square Range’ near Rock Flat. The Stokes family had lived at ‘Square Range’ since the 1860s and Eileen’s maternal grandparents, the Parkers, are a well-known family from Peak View.

There are still many descendants of both the Stokes and Parker families in the Cooma district, including two first cousins in their nineties. Eileen, however, so far holds the record for the longest-living member of the immediate Stokes and Parker families. Her mother, Emma, made it to 96 years.

Eileen worked at the Cooma Post Office for a few years in the late 1940s-early 50s, at the beginning of the Snowy Scheme. After marrying her husband, Tom, in 1953, they lived on a sheep and cattle farm near Nimmitabel.

Eileen and Tom raised four daughters and led a busy life on the farm. They were basically self-sufficient, had an extensive vegetable garden and orchard and made good use of the produce.

Eileen even made their own butter with cream from the Jersey cows. She was a good seamstress and an excellent knitter. Knitting has always been an important activity and it is a big regret that she can no longer see well enough to knit.

Eileen was also involved with the Nimmitabel Show where she was a pavilion steward for the food/baking section for more than 50 years.

She was honoured to be made a life member of the Nimmitabel Show Society.

The show continues to be one of her favourite events and she hasn’t missed many shows since 1953.

Her tips for a long-life include a large measure of good luck, cups of black tea and home-made cakes and being surrounded by family and good friends.