Lifelong Eddy County resident to turn 100

This Saturday, Aug. 18, Thelma (Sund) Myhre of New Rockford will celebrate her 100th birthday. She is a centenarian who is still living in her own home, and she's also a lifelong resident of Eddy County.

 Thelma was born in 1918, in the midst of the Great War and the influenza pandemic, during the year when Daylight Savings Time was enacted and a full two years before women had the right to vote.

So much has changed since that year when Thelma was born to Edward and Petra Sund on a farm west of Sheyenne, just one-and-a-half miles straight south of the Grandfield Lutheran Church. She is lifelong member of that little country church where she was baptized, one of few country churches in Eddy County still in operation today.

The oldest of eight children on the Sund farm, Thelma helped her parents grow and harvest wheat, oats and some barley. They also had dairy cows. The farm was homesteaded by Thelma's great-uncle, Nick Thorson. She attended a country school one mile from the Grandfield Lutheran Church; the building still stands today, albeit falling down.

When Thelma was wed to James Orville Myhre of rural Sheyenne on July 20, 1941, they did what many young couples at that time did: they got married in the Grandfield Lutheran Church parsonage in Sheyenne. Then their guests, mostly family, went back to the Sund family farm for a small reception. Orville's dad, Nyles, was also an original Eddy County homesteader.

Orville and Thelma then moved to a farm one mile west of U.S. Hwy. 281 just south of the Continental Divide. The couple raised three children on that farm, Jerry, Nyle and Janice, and they lived off the land, raising mostly the same crops as the Sunds. All the land is still in the family, as son Nyle and wife LaVonne now live and work on the farm.

Eldest son Jerry attended his first year of school, the first grade, in the Divide School. Then, due to consolidation, the school closed, sending the children to Sheyenne Public School. All three graduated from there, while the Divide School building was moved into Sheyenne for use as a teacherage, according to Thelma.

In 1969, the pair moved into a nearly new home in New Rockford, the very same one where Thelma lives almost 50 years later. Orville continued to drive out to the farm everyday until he could no longer do so. He died in 2001.

It seems that Thelma has lived the quintessential rural Midwestern life, spending about half her life on both a farm and in a small community. She has raised children, crops and animals, and has been involved in her church and community. She's been an active member of WELCA (Ladies Aid), a Sunday School teacher and also served as secretary/treasurer of Grandfield Church.

She and her husband enjoyed round dancing, or choreographed ballroom dancing for couples, and square dancing together. Thelma also sang in the Silver Chords, a community choir in Sheyenne, and in the church choir.

When asked what the secret is to reaching 100 years old and still living at home, Thelma said she didn't know. She speaks well, sitting in her well-kept living room near the picture window that faces the street. Photos of family are on display throughout the room, including one of Thelma and Orville that reveals a couple who grew old together. Thelma has a monthly date with daughter Janice at the Bakers Dozen, where the two enjoy lunch and a chat. Other than that, she said she doesn't get out much anymore.

Centenarians are still very rare, as in fact less than two Americans out of every 1,000 reach 100 years old. However, from 1980 to 2010, the centenarian population experienced a larger percentage increase than did the total population, realizing a 65.8 percent increase, while the total population increased only 36.3 percent. The report further noted that Caucasian women living in the Midwest or Northeast have more favorable odds of reaching 100 than others, and 30 percent do still live at home.

Celebrate this milestone with Thelma at an Open House held in her honor at the former Sheyenne School Gymnasium on Saturday, Aug. 18 from 2 - 4 p.m.