Ivy Bean has passed away at the age of 104. Most likely the oldest regular user (if not user) of Facebook, Ivy Bean kept her (at last count) 4,949 friends up to speed with her life.
On August, 15, 2008 an article described Ivy as being “the world’s oldest facebook user.” At that time she had 9 friends. In less than two years she found a way to touch an additional 4,940 people’s lives on a daily basis.
Born in Bradford, England in 1905, Ivy worked as a mill worker from the age of 14 until she was 73.
Ivy heard about Facebook.com from some caregivers at the assisted living facility that she moved into when she was 101. Within a year she was online and updated her account on a regular basis.
Ivy embraced the social networking website and was quickly embraced by a growing number of online friends and followers.
Below is an interview of Ivy in 2008. It isn’t what you think. She’s using a web camera, has a headset and is using Skype (or an online video program) to talk to Olly Mann on tv!
Ivy is a great example of how a senior can benefit from computer lessons and connect with friends and family online. What is clear from Ivy’s facebook posts is that she had local family that would regularly come and see her and engage her in activities and conversation.
Many of the 1.1 million seniors in the San Francisco Bay Area do not have family nearby that can regularly visit them. In fact, 9 out of 10 of these seniors want to remain in their homes making it less likely that they’ll receive computer lessons to get them online to connect with other people online like Ivy did.
