Naomi Berenice Proud celebrated her 100th birthday Thursday with her favorite boiled cake, a trumpet rendition of “Happy Birthday” and the company of friends and a lot of fun memories.

Her landmark celebration started Wednesday with a birthday eve party with her son Bill and daughter-in-law Barb, and then continued into Thursday her with longtime friends at Heritage Place in Kalispell.

After a century of life, Berenice remains full of laughter and fond memories of life with her late husband Daryl, sons Jim and Bill and a large extended family. She attributes her long life and good health to never smoking, rarely drinking and staying active.

“Get out and run,” she said with her characteristic laugh. “I had to run to keep up with Daryl.”

From the day she was born Naomi Berenice Thomas on April 11, 1913, Berenice was blessed with a loving family. Her mother and father, Jane and Jerome Thomas, were pleased to welcome a girl into their family when she was born on her grandparents’ farm in Proctor.

“A big noise was made,” Berenice said, “because I had two older brothers.”

Another brother and younger sister rounded out her family. Growing up, Berenice attended “a very good school” in Dayton, and then high school in Kalispell.

“My dad worked as a carpenter until he decided he wanted to grow things,” she said. “Then he grew too much and had to travel around and sell all the way to Perma.”

Her dad and Uncle Charlie Thomas founded Camp Tuffit on Lake Mary Ronan. She remembered fun times with the family and visitors at the camp.

“People would have a ball sitting round the campfire,” she recalled.

When she was 19, Berenice married Daryl Proud, a friend she knew from school and her brothers’ track meets. They lived at first on his parents’ property.

“His parents had a handy, hard-to-beat building that we could live in,” Berenice remembered with a laugh. “I won’t say too much about it.”

Daryl started out in logging to support Berenice, their children and a lot of their friends and cousins.

“Out of two kids, I think I had about dozen,” she said.

Times were hard during the Depression. To survive, Daryl and other men worked together to cut and make ties to sell to the railroad.

When World War II raged, Daryl enlisted, but the armistice was signed only a few weeks later. Daryl liked to say, “They heard I was coming and they gave up!”

He served in the Pacific Theater before returning to his family, who lived in Washington for a time. In 1949 when his father died, he and Berenice returned to Dayton to help his mother operate the family ranch.

They raised hay and several hundred head of cattle. Berenice sometimes drove around the fields in their snub-nosed Jeep with a wooden feeding platform that Daryl built over the top, where he and the dog often rode together.

Berenice still gets a good laugh over the time she gunned the Jeep, but saw the dog’s paws come on the windshield, so she slammed on the brakes, sending Daryl flying instead into a field of cow pies.

Her family also sold Christmas trees for years. They started out cutting trees in the woods near Camp Tuffit and baling them in the snow.

Eventually they sold the trees from a lot in Elmo. Berenice said they needed diverse sources of income.

“The cows made the good living, but it was up and down,” she said.

After retiring from farming in 1973, Berenice and Daryl finally had time to pursue their mutual love of golf and bowling. They traveled to Hawaii and to various golf courses around the country.

“We enjoyed doing things together,” she said. “When the season was right to try different things, we stuck our nose into them to see how much fun they were.”

After Daryl died, Berenice remained on her own at the farm in Dayton until five years ago. She lived at a facility in Polson before moving to Heritage Place in Kalispell about a year ago.

Reflecting on her life, Berenice said they had to work very hard for their good living. They also enjoyed close ties with family and friendships with all the surrounding families.

“Some people wouldn’t have liked it, but I think I had a good life,” she said.

Berenice now has five grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.