If there is anything that can help you live to be 100 years old, it has to be music, says Mildred Kathleen Hull.

Hull, of Mount Washington, turned 100 Tuesday and spent the day quietly after a weekend of celebration with her family and friends.

"I don't see how people can get along without music," she said. "It does so much for your mind. I can't think of anything that is more relaxing."

Hull said she spends much of her time playing the piano at night in her home, where she lives independently. She has lived in the same house she and her husband, Harold (now deceased), built in 1940.

She prefers old-time favorites like "Stardust," "Midnight Serenade" and "I'll Be Seeing You."

"My favorite is 'Ol' Man River,'" she said.

Enjoying music along with people is sort of a daily diet for her. She has someone read to her, because she is legally blind.

She likes to tell people about meeting Warren G. Harding when he campaigned for president in 1920 in the area around LaRue, Ohio, where she was born.

"He was very handsome," she said. "I was walking around town with two cousins when we heard (he) was in town. We took off running to meet him. Suddenly this guy said, 'Where are you girls going?' It was him."

Her favorite president was Dwight D. Eisenhower, she said, because students in fifth- and sixth-grade classes she taught in Anderson Township received two letters from him.

"It was a class project to write to the president. After the class received a letter, we had a call from the White House asking if we had received it. Then we received another letter to make sure," she said. "And the big excitement to the class is that we were able to watch the inauguration on television."

Hull taught school for 20 years before she retired 39 years ago.

She said her weekend celebration included a family dinner Saturday at the Mariemont Inn, church Sunday at Mount Washington Methodist Church and an open house at the church Sunday night.

She is the oldest member at the church, oldest graduate of Edgecliff College (now Xavier University) and oldest resident of LaRue, where she led the sesquicentennial parade in 2001.

"She is a remarkable lady at this age," said her granddaughter, Susan Swartz of Oakley. "She had fun over the weekend with about 100 relatives from Connecticut, Georgia, South and North Carolina."

Married 62 years, Hull has two daughters, five grandchildren and six great- grandchildren.

Allen Howard's "Some Good News'' column runs Sunday-Friday. If you have suggestions about outstanding achievements, or people who are uplifting to the Tristate, let him know at 768-8362, at ahoward@enquirer.com or by fax at 768-8340.