Opal Thompson

Opal Mae Thompson (née Cook; 13 January 1901 - 20 October 2014) was an American supercentenarian.

Biography
Opal Mae was born was born on 13 January 1901, one of 12 children of James A. Cook (1865-1943) and Nancy Jane Green Cook (1867-1947), in what is now Ripley, Oklahoma, but was then Indian Territory. She spent most of her adult life in Long Beach, California where she worked as a waitress and in a health food store. Opal left home at the age of 16 for her first job (working in a department store in Cushing, Oklahoma). Opal was right in the middle of her siblings; she had two older brothers above her and three younger brothers. In 1924, she married Richard Thompson, a fireman on the Santa Fe Railroad and professional wrestler. They had just one son, Richard Clayton Thompson. In 1930, Opal's husband was offered at Folsom Prison and the couple moved to the Folsom area, living outside the prison for two years and inside for five.

Opal regularly drove until she was 103 years old and took her last drive on the day she turned 105. Opal passed away on 20 October 2014 at the Diamond Ridge Healthcare Center nursing home, where she had lived since 2007 after moving to Antioch two years earlier from Long Beach to be closer to family members. She passed away aged 113 years, 280 days as the oldest living person in California.