Happy 100th Bea Day

When Bea Fettic Jones was 7 years old she was one of the first students to attend school in the Genoa Courthouse. The former seat of county government was still warm. Officials had moved into their new offices in Minden, leaving the courthouse to be used as a school. The family lived in Genoa, where her father built a house.

Jones is celebrating her 100th birthday on Sunday with her family and friends organized by her nieces, Starla Smith and Bonnie Fettic. Family members are coming from as far away as Orvada and Winnemucca.

Born in Carson Valley, she remembers driving her grandmother to see her uncle George in Carson City before what is now Highway 395 existed.

"In those days, the road went along the mountain and came out near the Indian school," she remembered. "I would drive my grandmother in my father's Ford. Grandma didn't know how to drive, but she always would tell you what to do."

On one egg run to her uncle's Bea had enough. Her grandmother had a lap full of eggs and was side seat driving when Bea hit a big bump.

"And up went the eggs," she said telling one of her favorite stories. "I've had a very interesting life."

The Fettics were shopkeepers and her family owned the Fettic Exchange, in what is now the Genoa bar.

Her great-grandmother was Eliza Mott, a member of the family that pioneered Mottsville.

She said she and her mother used to walk through Genoa to get a bucket of milk, because her grandfather had to have milk and cake before he went to bed.

She can still list the places along the way, including the building that now serves as Trimmer Outpost and the Raycraft Hall, where people would hold the Candy Dance.

"I'm not old," said Jones, who was driving herself around until three years ago. "I feel as good now as I've ever felt."

After she finished grammar school in Genoa she went to Douglas County High School.

The trip from Genoa to Gardnerville every day for school was too long, so Bea stayed with her grandmother during the week.

"My family would go to grandmother's for Sunday dinner and then they would go home and leave me to go to school."

Jones graduated with the 15 members of the class of 1928.

She was named a woman in history in 2001.