Helen Phipps celebrated her 99th birthday on Nov. 20 with her brother
and friends at a party at her Glendale home, where she has lived
since 1963.
She blew out her candles on her birthday cake surrounded by her
95-year-old brother, William Breitholle, who lives with her, their
neighbor, John Ryan, and Phipps' caregiver, Sifora Kiessya of
Hawthorne.
Phipps said her hobbies are "sitting in her big comfortable chair"
while reading the Los Angeles Times every day -- she has been a
subscriber for 60 years -- and watching TV news programs and the game
show "Jeopardy."
"She guesses a lot of the answers," Kiessya said.
Phipps retired after working for 43 years as a legal secretary in
downtown Los Angeles. Her husband, the late Stanley A. Phipps, was a
Superior Court judge for 18 years. He had worked as a lawyer for
Douglas Aircraft. He died July 16, 1979. The couple were married in
1933.
Helen Phipps was born in Pasadena and graduated from Pasadena High
School. She went to UCLA and to UC Berkeley, where she received a
teaching credential in swimming and diving. She formed three swimming
clubs in Los Angeles and several for the Fourth of July festivals on
Catalina Island.
She traveled for 10 years throughout Asia and Europe. She loved
Asia the most, because it was so clean and smelled so nice, she said.
"They bring you a kimono and slippers when you enter a home," she
said. "They are very polite people."
