By Chris Mayhew
Enquirer staff writer

WALTON - Believed to be one of the oldest persons in Kentucky, Agnes M. Sleet lived to be 108 before she died this week at a Florence care center.

Mrs. Sleet had said her belief in Jesus Christ kept her going, said her great-niece, Antonia G. Smith of Walton.

A lifetime resident of Boone County, she died Monday at Woodspoint Geriatric Health Care Center

Her father, Andrew Robinson, became the first black landowner in Boone County shortly after the end of the Civil War when he bought a farm on Chambers Road a little more than two miles outside Walton. Robinson and his wife had traveled in a covered wagon from Missouri to Boone County.

She grew up on her father's farm and married Walter Sleet in 1922 - moving to another farm on Chambers Road with her husband. She lived on the farm until age 92 when she moved to Walton, a few doors down from Zion Baptist Church.

Her husband died in 1976 when he was 96, and she was 81.

"She wore white gloves and was a Christian lady," Smith said. "She believed in the Lord, and she said that's what kept her for 108 years."

Mrs. Sleet witnessed the entire 20th century.

"She was 2 when the Spanish-American War was happening," Smith said.

Mrs. Sleet received a letter of recognition for her longevity and contributions to the country from President Bush on Monday, arriving on the day she died, her great-niece said.

She was health conscious and was careful what she ate, having been diagnosed with diabetes at age 17, Smith said.

She was the youngest of 19 children but never had any children of her own, and was always entertaining her nieces and nephews on her farm.

"When I was young, we picked blackberries together on her farm," Smith said. "We would meet at the top of the hill and she would raise up her sunglasses and wink at you. That's how I learned to wink."

Mrs. Sleet was a church mother at Zion Baptist Church in Walton and belonged to the church choir.

Her niece said she was a member of the homemakers group in Boone County in the 1940s and would teach people how to set a table properly and other forms of etiquette.

Last year she won the best-dressed award at Woodspoint, where she lived her last years, her niece said.

"She was just so elegant," her niece said.

Other survivors include nieces Sarah Wright and Emma Sleet, both of Cincinnati, Mattie Pearl Stephenson of Dayton, Ohio, and Anna Lett of California state; another great-niece, Rosella Porterfield of Walton; two nephews, Richard Sleet of Cincinnati and David French of Walton; and many other nieces and nephews who live in Tennessee.

Visitation will be 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. and service 1 p.m. today at Zion Baptist Church, 35 Church St., Walton. Burial will be in Richwood Cemetery.

Jones, Simpson & Gee Funeral Home in Covington is handling arrangements.

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E-mail cmayhew@enquirer.com