A SPECIAL woman celebrated a special day yesterday - and not just because it was Christmas.

Christina Yorke had more reason than most to celebrate Christmas Day because it also marked her 100th birthday.

The great-grandmother, a resident at Denehurst Nursing Home, Ferryhill, County Durham, has had an eventful life.

She was born Christina Susannah Crannis on December 25, 1903, in a cottage next to London's Hornsey fire station where her father was chief fire officer in the days of horse-drawn fire engines.

The youngest of three children, her mother died very soon after her birth. Her father married the mother of his eldest son's wife.

Mrs Yorke often talks fondly of her childhood and remembers being teased by her brothers, sliding down the firemen's pole and watching the harness drop on to horses when the fire bell sounded.

She married Percy Yorke on May 11, 1929, and has one son, David, a granddaughter, Kirsten, and four great-grandchildren, Matthew, 11, Luke, nine, Savannah-Rose, five, and Kizzy, two.

Mrs Yorke worked as a seamstress for much of her life and helped to make the Coronation robes for the late Queen Mother.

Later, she worked for the Middlesex school meals service until retirement age, after which she ran a school tuck shop in north London until she was 80.

She and her husband moved to Belmont, Durham City, to be near their son and his family, joining the local Women's Institute where she baked and gave painting lessons at an old people's home.

Mr Yorke died in 1986. Mrs Yorke continued to live in Belmont until she was 98 when she moved to Denehurst.

Home manager Charlotte Marriner said Mrs Yorke's birthday celebrations would be held tomorrow. She said: "She's a lovely character and well liked by all the staff and residents."