By Suzanne Hodgson
Staff Writer

According to many who knew her, Katarina Voit thought she was famous.
Voit, the subject of newspaper articles and holder of the Boston Post Cane, was a local celebrity: At age 109, she was the oldest living person in Kennebunk.
Voit died on Dec. 28 at the Kennebunk Nursing Home.
She received the town’s Boston Post Cane in 2006 on her 106th birthday. The tradition started in 1909, when Boston Post publisher Edwin Grozier gave the boards of selectmen in 700 towns a gold-topped ebony cane to be given to each town’s oldest resident.
Rep. Christopher Babbidge also presented Voit a certificate of recognition from the state.
“She knew she was the queen around here,” said Shirley Narcross, who helped Voit at the nursing home. Narcross was Voit’s “Angel” under a program in the home that pairs patients with someone to give them extra care.
Voit would take part in many of the home’s activities including singing and bowling – she would lift the ball above her head, throw it down the lane and get a strike.
Voit, an immigrant from Germany, sang “Oh Tannenbaum” (“Oh Christmas Tree”) in German for other residents during the home’s Christmas party.
According to three  nursing home workers who spent time with her, Voit always sat in the home’s front hallway, greeting visitors and wearing her aqua vest and Mardi Gras beads. She enjoyed routine and watched “The Lawrence Welk Show” daily.
Ellen Pelletier, who has known Voit since she was a child, said she looked after Voit after her husband died.
“She used to say to me ‘I’m old, you know,’” said Pelletier, “and I would say, ‘You think?’ She would get such a kick out of that.”
Pelletier said she loved to go to Lord’s Seafood with at least 10 friends for her big birthday dinner.
“After her 107th birthday I asked her how old she was and she said ‘I don’t know, 100 and something, but I feel like I’m 80’” said Narcross.
“She will be missed,” said Molly Joyce, a speech therapist at the nursing home.
Born in Ulm, Germany, in 1900, Voit came to America with a girlfriend at the age of 29. After marrying her husband, Max, four years later, the couple moved to Wells, where Max worked in the Sanford mills.
In 1944, Max came home from the mill and asked if she would like to help raise a young girl.
Pelletier lived with the family for the next eight years on the Wells farm.
 “My good qualities and values I got from her,” said Pelletier.
When the mill closed in the late 1950s, the Voits moved to California to run a small hotel in Santa Anita before retiring a decade later and moving to Connecticut.
Max died in the late 1960s and a short time later, Voit moved to Philadelphia, where Pelletier was living.
At the age of 78 Voit decided to get her driver’s license.  Pelletier explained that while Max was alive he did all the driving, but Voit decided if she was living alone, she needed a way to get around.
“I helped teach her to drive,” said Pelletier. “When she would park her car she had to maneuver around mine and I would think ‘Oh my God, please don’t hit my car.’”
In 1980, Pelletier and Voit moved to Kennebunk where Pelletier still lives today with her husband, Al. Voit stayed with Pelletier until three years ago, when she moved into the nursing home, a five minute trip from Pelletier’s house.
“Al and I are so pleased the nursing home took care of her and cared for her,” Pelletier said.
The Kennebunk Town Clerk’s Office will research  who is currently the oldest living person in the town so the Boston Post Cane can be passed on.
A celebration of life is being planned in honor of Voit for sometime in the spring.
    
Staff Writer Suzanne Hodgson can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 233.