‘Go and look for employment,’ centenarian tells youth

Centenarian Leroy Pitt, famously known as Kitty, worked tirelessly all her life  – an attribute she wants to be passed on the younger generation of Barbados.

As the island’s newest centenarian celebrated this momentous occasion surrounded by family and friends and in the presence of Governor General Dame Sandra Mason in her Sergeant Village Christ Church home, she urged the youth to tighten their boot straps.

“I want the young people to behave themselves and go and look for employment. Every morning you wake up you hear somebody dead,” Pitt warned.

The former agriculture worker was married to Athelbert Pitt (deceased) and  is the mother to six children, 17 grandchildren, 38 great grandchildren and 11 great-great grandchildren.

Pitt is the first in her family to reach 100, a feat she never imagined she would achieved.

Pitt attributed her longevity to her faith in God, hearty appetite and also to her active lifestyle. Despite her age, she possesses a sharp memory and helps her family with household chores.

“If there is anything to do [at home] I will help, I don’t sit down and draw up. I does turn around and whatever I could do I do,” Pitt told the media this morning.

She also makes and sells rag mats/rugs to keep herself occupied.

“I does still pick a little dollar, I like my money,” Pitt said with a laugh.

The youngest of her surviving children, Lionel Pitt shared that his mother had immense love for her children, often taking them on tours across the island during the bank holidays but she was also quite the disciplinarian.

“Licks like fire if you do anything wrong but the only thing I didn’t like was because I was the last she never used to beat me she used to say ‘wait until you father come home.’”

“I remember my mother leaving to go to work on mornings, she think that we sleeping but we could smell the food cooking. She used to tell our grandmother ma make sure they get to school hear,” he added.