History for Chron

A Spokane resident, who is the third cousin to President Abraham Lincoln, will celebrate her 100th birthday.

Alta Prudence Campbell, who lives on West Mission Avenue, is related to the former president through her father. His aunt was Lincoln’s mother, Nancy Hanks.

Campbell was born in Ohio but grew up in Minnesota. Campbell said she remembered the day that someone came to their farm near St. Paul in 1865 to inform her family that Lincoln had been assassinated.

Campbell’s husband was killed during the great fire of 1910. Of her four sons, three fought in the Spanish-American War and one fought in World War I.

Her brother served the Union in the Civil War, and two of her grandsons and a grandson-in-law all fought in World War II.

“I’ve always made it a point never to worry,” Campbell said. “Whatever is coming will come and worrying won’t help any.”