Fannie Diggs Ware of Cardinal, celebrated her 90th birthday on Sunday. Born to Ophemia and Wormley Diggs on Jan. 23, 1932, she has lived in the vicinity of Cardinal all her life, and is a lifelong member of Zion Baptist Church.

Ware attended Hicks Wharf School and Thomas Hunter High School, where she was May Queen in 1948, then attended St. Paul’s Polytechnic Institute in Lawrenceville.

To earn some money, she began working at the age of 7 by picking daffodils, then digging potatoes and picking strawberries. She has maintained an active interest in her community all her life, especially against litter, winning $10 for a Keep Virginia Green essay while in her teens, and writing a letter to the Gazette-Journal about litter a few years ago.

She spent many of her adult years as a crab picker at various seafood firms, and in 1955 caused a sensation, while working for Elwood Callis at Callis Wharf on Gwynn’s Island, by picking 100 pounds of crabmeat.

She said, “I have to be movi...