Ninety Years

Suzanne Newton is 90 years old! I wanted to experience 90. I wanted to feel what 90 feels like. I wanted to make 90 somethings. I thought about some sort of origami project but realized I would have had to begin this idea months ago. And I only had two days to create. And so the beads. I hand rolled 90 paper beads and attached them to a birthday crown to give to Suzanne.

Halfway through this project I suddenly realized how very young I am. It seems like 39 bead years should be a lot. And really it is. But I made 39 beads, and I still had 51 more to make to get to 90! And every bead is a year lived. WOW!

90 years. How much life: love, loss, stories, adventures, relationships, travel, style, inventions, how many years! And from what I have heard, Suzanne has always lived life. Just think of the changes that she has experienced in her lifetime...

Ninety years ago:

• The FIRST World War has just ended.
• Women are just given the right to vote with the passage of the 19th amendment to the constitution.
• The 18th amendment to the constitution prohibits the production, sales or transportation of alcoholic beverages: Prohibition.
• The "Jazz Age" begins.
• The average earnings for a family in the US is $1236.
• It takes 13 days to reach California from New York. There are 387,000 miles of paved road.
• The life expectancy for a male is 53.6 and for a female, 54.6.
• Henry Ford's combustion engine and assembly line production of the automobile begins to allow affordability to the middle class.
• United Artists Corporation is formed by Charles Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D.W. Griffith.
• The flu and pneumonia spread worldwide killing thousands.
• The New York Yankees buy Babe Ruth.
• The first commercial radio station in the U.S. begins in Detroit, Michigan and the first radios appear for sale.
• Traffic lights, the Band-Aid and the hair dryer are invented.