Rockwall Resident Celebrates 100th Birthday

Rockwall Resident Celebrates 100th Birthday

(ROCKWALL, TX — March 19, 2019) Rockwall resident Dottie Lillard celebrated her 100th birthday St. Patrick’s Day style with a leprechaun-hat-shaped birthday cake and lots of green! Here are a few fun facts about Dottie from her friends and family:

  • Dottie was born on March 17, 1919, weighing only three and a half pounds and beat the odds by surviving when many preemie’s of that time and age did not.
  • She was born in the middle of 11 children, and is the last living of her siblings.
  • Her family had a farm and she worked hard in the cotton fields.  Her mom sewed all their clothes and made her a beautiful jacket just like one she saw in a magazine without using a sewing pattern.
  • She remembers Rockwall when it was all dirt roads and very few cars.
  • She remembers that the building at 101 S. Fannin St. (where Pier One is located) was a “Ford House” (car dealership).  But she never learned to drive herself.
  • After the war, her late husband, Buddy and her owned the Mecca Café on the downtown square of Rockwall for 25 years.
  • Her sister Lillian Jacobs (who passed in 2017) was a vice president of First State Bank of Rockwall for around 40 years.
  • She has been a member of First Baptist Church of Rockwall for 86 years!
  • She has been blessed in this life with loving friends and family.

Photos submitted by Carolann David. Dottie is Carolann’s great aunt.

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