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Evelyn Kozak, World’s Oldest Jew, Dies at 113

A woman who claimed the title of the world’s oldest Jewish person died in New York at age 113, the Associated Press reported.

Evelyn Kozak, who was born on Aug. 14, 1899, died early Tuesday in a hospital after suffering a heart attack the day before, according to her granddaughter Brucha Weisberger.

Gerontology Research Group senior database administrator Robert Young told the AP Kozak was the world’s oldest documented Jewish person and the seventh-oldest person in the world.

Kozak, who was one of nine children, was born to a family that had immigrated to the U.S. from Russia to escape anti-Semitic attacks.

Kozak had five children, 10 grandchildren and nearly 30 great-grandchildren. She lived in New York, Perth Amboy, N.J., Miami and Pittsburgh

The death raises the tantalizing prospect that there are only a handful of people on earth today who were born before 1900.

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