SIDNEY — Virginia Schiff Fields, of Sidney, will celebrate her 100th birthday, Aug. 5, 2017, with family and friends.

She was born Aug. 5, 1917, in Anna, the daughter of Leona and Elza Hagelberger. She graduated from Anna High School and attended the Cadet Teaching Program of Capital University.

Fields taught first and second grades in Botkins for one year. She married Chalmer Fields in 1938. They had to keep their marriage a secret, because married women were not permitted to teach then.

When their son, David, was born in 1942, Fields became a stay-at-home mom until she returned to teaching in the early 1950s. She and another teacher began the first kindergarten in Sidney. The classes were at Whittier, Emerson, Parkwood and Lowell schools. She taught kindergarten for seven years and then first and second grades at Parkwood. Virginia said that the students thought she was smarter when she was able to move to second grade.

Fields retired in 1977. Her son, David, and his wife, Kathie, live in Sidney. Fields has two grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.