She was born in Kamouraska, Quebec, and married her first husband, Etienne Leclerc, there in 1900. After he and both her parents died in 1911-1912, in 1913 she left two of her four surviving children behind and moved to the Ontario border. Only once, in 1939, did she return to the Kamouraska area.
She had six further children by her second husband, Hector Meilleur, who she married in 1915. After his death in 1972 she lived first with a daughter and then in a nursing home in Corbeil, Ontario.
By the time she died one of her sons was also living in the same nursing home. She was said to be a vegetarian while Mrs. Knauss, her successor as world's oldest, had a weakness for junk food.
| Preceded by: Jeanne Calment |
Oldest Person in the World | Succeeded by: Sarah Knauss |