OREANDA-NEWS Japanese Kane Tanaka, who in 2019 was recognized as the oldest person on Earth, died on April 19 at the age of 120. This is reported by NHK TV channel. Kane Tanaka was born before the Russian-Japanese War in 1903 in the family of Kumakichi and Kuma Ota, where there were already six children. Kane survived two world wars and saw the reign of five emperors, starting with the reformer Emperor Meiji and ending with his great-grandson, the current Emperor Naruhito.

At the age of 19, she married Hideo Tanaka, they had four children, and they adopted the fifth. Hideo ran a family business producing rice, Japanese sweets and udon noodles. Her husband and eldest son fought in World War II, and Nobuo son was even captured by the USSR, and returned to Japan in 1947.

Kane Tanaka started the family business after her husband was drafted into the army, and continued to participate in the management of the family store until the age of 103, CNN reported.

In March 2019, Kane Tanaka was listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the oldest inhabitant of the planet, at that time she was 116 years and 28 days old. KaneTanaka also set a record for life expectancy in Japan itself. In recent years, Tanaka has been living in a nursing home in Fukuoka Prefecture, Japan, and celebrated her 119th birthday in January. According to NHK, the woman said that she would like to live to 120 years.