Jeanne Louise Calment

Jeanne Louise Calment had the longest confirmed human life span in history, living to the age of 122 years, 164 days (44724 days total). She lived in Arles, France, for her entire life, and outlived both her daughter and grandson. She became especially well known from the age of 113, when the centenary of Vincent van Gogh's visit brought reporters to Arles. She entered the Guinness Book of Records in 1988, and on 17 October 1995 she became the oldest person ever, having surpassed the (now dubious) case of Shigechiyo Izumi of Japan. She became the last living documented person born in the 1870s when the Japanese super centenarian Tane Ikai (born 1879) died on 12 July 1995. In 1985, Calment moved into a nursing home, having lived on her own until age 110. Her international fame escalated in 1988, when the centenary of Vincent van Gogh's visit to Arles provided an occasion to meet reporters. She said at the time that she had met Van Gogh 100 years before, in 1888, as a thirteen-year-old girl in her uncle's fabric shop, where he wanted to buy some canvas, later describing him as "dirty, badly dressed and disagreeable", and "very ugly, ungracious, impolite, sick". Calment recalled selling colored pencils to Van Gogh, and seeing the Eiffel Tower being built. At the age of 114, she appeared briefly in the 1990 film Vincent and Me as herself, making her the oldest person ever to appear in a motion picture. A documentary film about her life, entitled Beyond 120 Years with Jeanne Calment, in 1995. In 1996, Time's Mistress, a four-track CD of Calment speaking over a background of rap, was released. On her 122nd birthday on 21 February 1997, it was announced that she would make no more public appearances, as her health had seriously deteriorated. She died on 4 August of that same year.