Centenarian sings praises of a good life

Frieda Grund, right, thanks piano player Dick Schmidt for playing at a party for her at Swan Creek Retirement Village.

Frieda Grund, who sang in choirs for most of her life, plans to celebrate her 100th birthday Saturday with a visit from her far-flung family.

The South Toledo resident turned 100 on March 10. She had a party at Swan Creek Retirement Village, where she lives, and she ll have another when her family visits.

The third-youngest of 12 children in the Jacobs family, she made singing a big part of her life. She said her whole family was musical, and they played together for entertainment on their farm near Luckey.

Everybody in our family played something, Mrs. Grund said.

Mrs. Grund later moved to Toledo, where she sang alto in the choir at St. Paul s Methodist Church, and later, at the Monroe Street Methodist Church. She was frequently a contralto soloist.

In the 1940s, she sang in the American Legion Women s Chorus, which won a contest in New York City. She also sang in the Toledo Choral Society.

When the family took trips to Michigan, Mrs. Grund played piano in the hotel lobby, her daughter, Janice Lane, said.

After her husband retired from Toledo Scale, she sang in a neighborhood choir when they stayed in Florida.

After college, she stayed in Toledo and got a job as a secretary at St. Paul s Methodist Church, where she worked for about 10 years. There, she met Walden Grund, whom she married in the mid-1930s. He died 25 years ago.

After she married, Mrs. Grund became a homemaker. She later went back to work as a secretary for the superintendent of the Methodist district, a job she said she enjoyed.

She has lived in the Swan Creek Retirement Village in South Toledo for about six years.