Lifestyle

At 101, Ann Was Still Going to Work Six Days a Week at Her Jewelry Store. Ask Her About Retiring: “I’m Happy Working Every Day”

By Mike Harper · November 10, 2026

Every week, Ann Angeletti can be found buzzing around New York’s Diamond District, checking on her customers and still bargaining for a better price. That is how a segment from WABC-TV’s Eyewitness News introduces her.

Then the reporter brings up her age. “Don’t forget I’m a hundred,” Angeletti says. “A hundred and one to be exact.”

The story aired in October 2025, and its video on the station’s YouTube channel has passed 5 million views. Reporter Nina Pineda followed Angeletti, who runs Curiosity Jewelers in Cresskill, New Jersey, with her daughter and granddaughter.

Hard work started early for her. According to the station, she left school as a child to help at her family’s grocery store in Brooklyn, and her father sold ice door to door from a horse-drawn cart. When her husband went off to fight in World War II, she went to work at the Navy Yard, then as a waitress.

The jewelry store came later. “I was driving by, the store was for rent and I called the owner and asked him, how much is the rent, and he said $85 a month in 1964,” she told the station.

Asked how many days a week she comes to work, she answers, “Six.” Her store is open five days, she explains, and on Mondays she goes into the city.

So what about retiring? “If I retire, I would die,” she says. “So, I cannot stay home.”

You can watch the segment on ABC7 New York’s YouTube channel.

Her advice for a long life starts with the basics. “Must get up, you must shower, you must eat, you must take care of yourself. You must exercise,” she told the station. “If you don’t like what you’re doing, then change.”

The segment says she focuses on building relationships first. “I don’t care if my customers don’t buy,” she says. “They come in, we have coffee.”

The segment ends with her simplest answer. “I’m happy working every day,” she says.

Working at 101 is rare, but working past 75 is becoming more common. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that 8.5% of Americans 75 and older were in the labor force in 2025, up from 6.4% in 2005, and it projects 10.1% by 2035. For women 75 and older, the 2025 rate was 6.6%.

Not everyone can or wants to work into their 90s or beyond. But if staying busy matters to you, Angeletti’s routine offers a few ideas:

Keep a daily structure. Her rules start with getting up, getting dressed and eating well.

Stay connected. She treats customers as friends first, coffee included.

Change what is not working. Her own advice is that if you don’t like what you’re doing, you should change it.

Share the load. She runs the store with her daughter and granddaughter.

This article is for general information and reflects the segment as it aired in October 2025. This article was produced with the assistance of AI and fact-checked against the sources cited by LightWave Reports.