Maria Branyas

Born in San Francisco on 4 March 1907, Maria Branyas Morera lived through two world wars, a pandemic, and the entire span of the twentieth century before claiming a title no one seeks: oldest person alive. She became the world's verified eldest on 17 January 2023, after the death of France's Lucile Randon. For nineteen months she held that lonely summit, a Catalan supercentenarian who had begun life in America and ended it as the last witness to 1907. She died on 19 August 2024, at 117 years and 168 days.