Barbara Simpson, granddaughter of the founder of the once famous Lane’s Emulsion, died on Wednesday.
Mrs Simpson, nee Douglas, who was born in Oamaru and brought up at Dome Hills Station near Livingston, also happened to be one of the oldest Waitaki Girls’ High School old girls living in the district.
She attended the school in the 1930s with her contemporary Janet Frame.
Mrs Simpson remained fit and active throughout her entire life, adopting a positive attitude after suffering polio as a 13-year-old.
"Life is not a rehearsal. You’ve just got to make the most of it," she said last September on turning 100.
Just before Christmas she gamely accompanied the Otago Daily Times down memory lane, on a visit to the original Lane’s Emulsion factory site in Harbour St.
Her grandfather and chemist, Edward George Lane, invented the tonic in 1898 with the claim it was a "reliable remedy for pulmonary ailments".
It was also notable for a strong fishy smell due to a high cod liver oil content and became a popular patent medicine — albeit something generations of New Zealanders probably endured.
At 100, Mrs Simpson vividly recalled the strong smell from Lane’s Emulsion permeating through what is now the Oamaru Victorian Precinct.
"It’s the reason I’ve lived so long, I’m sure. I took it my whole life," she said.
"The smell of it, some people loathed the smell, but that was part of my life, the smell of Lane’s Emulsion."
Mrs Simpson also recalled visiting her grandparents in their Tees St home where George Lane first formulated the tonic.
"He took up so much space and all the pots in the kitchen, so that Granny insisted that he find other premises, so that’s when he started, in the first place, his own chemist shop."
Mrs Simpson, a Dunedin Hospital-trained registered nurse, married stock and station agent Lindsay Simpson in 1947 and the couple had three children, John, James and Brett.
They spent their married life in Dunedin, Wellington and Auckland before returning to Oamaru where Mr Simpson died in 2013.
Mrs Simpson in her latter years was very involved in numerous groups across North Otago including the Waitaki Old Girls’ Association and the North Otago Tramping and Mountaineering Club.
On her 100th birthday she fondly recalled having "climbed every mountain" in the Kakanui Range and only hung up her tramping boots at 85.
Oamaru company Crombie and Price, which bought Lane’s Medicine in 1971, still holds the rights and recipe to Lane’s Emulsion. — Additional reporting Jules Chin
