Passed On At 94, With 500 Descendants

(Vernon, Texas) -- Gregoria Martinez, 94, might seem like your typical grandma. Except the Texas grandma didn't have just a handful of grandchildren when she died Tuesday. She had nearly 300. Ninety-eight were grandchildren; 164 were great-grandchildren and 16 were great-great-grandchildren — all descendants of her own 11 offspring.

That's without counting her three stepchildren or any of their descendants — or the three great-great grandchildren currently on the way. The family purposely underestimated the total count, but felt it could be as high as 500.

Martinez's survivors packed the 500-seat St. Mary's Church. The woman, "could fill up our elementary school in with all the great-grandchildren and the great-great-grandchildren," son-in-law Jesse Jalamo said. And she knew practically all of them.

She didn't preach about the benefits of large families, but did believe she was brought into the world to multiply. "You know Catholics," said daughter Elva Jaloma.

"They had 11 kids, and raised 14, and not one time did (they) draw a food stamp, a welfare check, or an unemployment check," Jaloma said of his in-laws. "They didn't believe in that. They said, 'If you want something, you work for it.'"

(By Ann Work,
Wichita Falls “Times Record News”)