It was reported on Friday, that Susannah Mushatt Jones, the granddaughter of slaves who held the title of "world's oldest living person" and "the last American born in the 19th century", has died at the age of 116.

On Thursday, she died in a Brooklyn nursing home where she had lived for three decades.

She was Born in July 6, 1899.

Jones credited her long life to not drinking, smoking or partying, a family member, and adding that the fresh fruit and vegetables she ate during her childhood helped maintain her health.

She graduated from school in 1922 before working full-time picking crops with family members on the same land her grandparents farmed as slaves.

Her grandmother lived to be 117 years old, according to US census data.

Married once with no children, she returned to Alabama after retiring in 1965. But as more of her family moved north, she returned to New York where she lived until her death.

She refused cataract surgery, leaving her blind and partially deaf.

At age 80, she moved into an elder home in Brooklyn where she continued to cook for herself and partake in the neighbourhood watch until she was 100.

Her reign as the world's oldest person commenced last year when 117-year-old Misao Okawa died in Tokyo in April 2015.

Now, 116-year-old Emma Morano from Italy, born after Jones on November 28, 1899, is the world's oldest person and one of the last living links to the 19th century.