A former school dinner lady has celebrated her 100th birthday.

Minster resident Madge Lees was visited by family, friends and the Mayor of Swale on Wednesday last week.

She was treated like royalty, with a birthday card from the Queen being the icing on the cake.

Everyone meeting her is disbelieving of her age – lively and quick-witted, she thinks and acts at least 20 years younger.

When she started work as a dinner lady she coped easily switching from feeding three children to providing meals for 300.

From 1944 to 1977 she was cook supervisor at Halfway Houses Primary School, and loved every day of it.

Popular with her own “ladies”, teachers and pupils, she earned the respect of three headmasters and is proud of the diploma she was awarded on retirement.

Born Margery Jilks in Hope Street, Sheerness, the house was not really big enough for her parents and six siblings so, aged 11, she was sent to live with older sister Winifred in Gravesend. The move was to have a huge impact.

On leaving school, she worked for Pearks the grocers and got to know young merchant seaman Ernest Lees, whose brother courted Winifred.

The two sisters married two brothers, and as a young bride Madge returned to Sheppey. She said: “Things weren’t like they are today.

“We had two rooms in Invicta Road, Sheerness, and the rent of seven shillings and sixpence a week wanted a bit of finding.”

With the arrival of daughter Sylvia, they needed more space and took larger rooms in St George’s Avenue.

They saved hard for a newly house – the one she lives in to this day – which had the price tag of £390.

She said: “It was a fortune but what we didn’t have we went without. My husband flatly refused to have hire purchase or anything on credit.”

Madge has lived alone now for 11 years since the death of her husband, just four days before their 70th wedding anniversary.

She keeps busy knitting, sewing, reading, doing crosswords and watching television.

The family keep a close eye on her and happily, although she does have her share of ailments, none are life-threatening.

And her daughter, two sons, 12 grandchildren 12 great-grandchildren and four great-great-grandchildren all live locally.