The first 100 years of Marian Bromeley’s life have gone so well,
she’s ready for some more.
“At 100 years, I have probably lived enough,” she told her son,
Thomas Bromeley, on her birthday in November. “But I feel so good
that I think I would like to go on a while longer. I am thinking of
108.”
Bromeley’s perseverance has been a hallmark in her life.
She was born Marian Laverne Grow on Nov. 22, 1906, in Duke
Center at a time when there was no electricity, the roads were dirt
and people didn’t lock their doors. She was one of three children
born to William F. Grow and Margaret Gillespie Grow.
“It’s not at all like it is now,” she said of life in Duke
Center. “It was very, very simple … we had a good time all the
time.”
“It never seemed like it changed, but it did,” she said. “We
knew everybody so well. There was no fear in our lives.”
Although Bromeley started her school career in Duke Center, she
attended high school in Bradford where she lived during the week
with her grandfather, Augustus Grow, who operated a bakery. At that
time, the trip from Duke Center to Bradford included a stagecoach
from Duke Center to Knapp Creek, N.Y. There, she would get on the
trolley which ran down to Derrick City, then on to Bradford.
Bromeley went on to study at Otterbein College in Westerville,
Ohio – a trip which took two days.
At Otterbein, she met her future husband, Robert Bromeley. They
graduated in 1929 and were married later that year on Oct. 19.
From there, the couple lived in Chicago, which Bromeley said was
“quite a change from Duke Center.”
Her husband was a salesman with the Shaw Walker office equipment
company. Then, in the early ’30s, the couple acquired the Smith
Agency insurance company in Bradford, where her husband engaged in
a variety of businesses throughout his life.
“I never thought of getting a job,” she said. “Never crossed my
mind.”
But that doesn’t mean Bromeley wasn’t busy, including raising
her children, Thomas and Catherine Daggett.
Bromeley was also one of the founders of the Bradford Landmark
Society, including spending long hours restoring Crook Farm, which,
at that time, was “not much other than a very small farmhouse.”
“I spent several days a week down there with friends,” she said.
“There was an awful lot of work to do. We worked like beavers …
it’s quite a nice place now.”
Crook Farm, with its annual fair, has become a community
institution for the area.
One of her proudest accomplishments – besides her family – was
bringing the Belvidere Villa near Belmont, N.Y., back to life.
In 1947, the Bromeleys acquired the mansion which had been
vacant for 12 years and did not have gas or electric.
The mansion was built by the original owner, John Church, to
entice other wealthy families to move to what was then the frontier
and to buy land from the extensive holdings which Church had.
The Bromeleys spent much of their lives restoring the house to
its former glory, including finding original furniture. Along the
way, the couple, along with their family, learned a lot about that
period in American history.
“It’s been wonderfully interesting,” she said.
Bromeley and her husband would go to the Allegany County home
every weekend.
They also built many other homes on that property for their
family members, which currently total five generations, including
two children, four grandchildren, 11 great-grandchildren and two
great-great-grandsons.
The mansion, which is listed on the National Register of
Historic Places, was also the place she celebrated her 100th
birthday with friends and family, a milestone “I never thought
about.”
Bromeley, who is also a member of the Junior Guild of the Church
of the Ascension and has been a member of American Association of
University Women and the Bradford Literary Club, still lives at
home with the help of an aide.
At 100, her medications consist of a baby aspirin and a vitamin
pill.
