Mary Golden, 101, received the Boston Post Cane on Tuesday in recognition as Gorham’s oldest citizen. Golden has lived in Gorham for more than 70 years.

Kimberly Getchell, assistant town clerk, presented the gold-top cane to Golden and a certificate that says Edwin A. Grozier, publisher of the Boston Post newspaper, originally presented it to the town in 1909. Getchell unwrapped a brand-new replica for Tuesday’s presentation. The original is kept in a Gorham Municipal Center display case.

As a promotion for the Post, Grozier had sent out canes to 431 towns across New England to be presented to each town’s oldest resident. Many towns still participate in the tradition.

Before Tuesday’s cane ceremony, Golden voted absentee at Gorham House where she’s a resident.

She and her husband, the late Jim Golden, in 1952 bought a farm in West Gorham where they cared for a herd of registered Ayrshire dairy cattle.

Mary Golden, daughter of a Cabot, Vermont, dairy farm family, has been a widow since 2003.

She and her husband met at the former Maine General Hospital in Portland. “I was an occupational therapist,” she said. “He was a 4-H agent for Cumberland County.”

Jim Golden launched a 4-H Club for children confined in the hospital.

She was widely known for her colorful flower gardens featuring peonies. “He enjoyed them, too,” she said. “We lived outdoors.”

“We loved the farm” named Goldmar, she said.

They lost their barn and home when it was struck by lighting many years ago, she said. They were away that day and were shocked by what they saw when they arrived home.

The cattle were safe outside, but the fire knocked them out of dairying. The house was “beyond repair” she said, but the cellar was saved.

They built back, but smaller. Besides raising flowers, they kept chickens, pigs and horses for their only child, Sharon.

Now, her daughter, a college instructor, and son-in-law, a veterinarian, raise short-horn beef cattle in Kentucky.

When Mary and her husband came to Gorham, she recalled it was a country town. “The town has changed a lot,” she said. “We’ve lost the farms.”

Now, she said, the Rust Farm is the only working dairy farm in their area of West Gorham. She said two others in Gorham, Parsons and Young, are the remaining active dairy farms in the entire town.

She said a commercial greenhouse in the village and the fairgrounds are long gone.

Mary easily recalled some old time West Gorham neighbors like Sam and Pinky Hoyt along with Nancy Taber.

Mary Golden was active at the West Gorham Church where she remembered a preacher, the Rev. Harrison Dubbs. She made Boston cream pies for the church’s bean suppers.

She also worked for several years as an election worker at the town polls. Former Town Clerk Brenda Caldwell, when asked Tuesday said, “Of course I know Mary, I hired her.”

Caldwell recalled an amusing Election Day story. She drove from the village to the old fire barn at West Gorham to check on the polling. She asked Mary to direct her to the ladies’ room and she said Mary pointed to a door. Caldwell proceeded through a door that led outside.

Caldwell was stunned. “It was an outhouse,” she said. “(Everyone) laughed.”

“We had some good times,” Golden said.