GOOD OLD DAYS:

Eloise Dennistoun isn’t able to hold court and greet friends from her “special bench” at Inspiration Point in Corona del Mar anymore.

The bench has been replaced by a wheelchair, but the woman who has always loved to flirt and laugh still offers a smile and hello to the people she sees every day.

Eloise, who turned 100 Saturday, was described by daughter Vivian Boulos as “Queen of the Hallway” at Avalon by the Sea, her assisted-living home for the past 10 years.

The sea has always been special to her mother, Vivian said. Eloise was born in a house just “doors from the sand” in the small beach community of Ocean Park.

“Mother was proud to be a Native Californian, and loved her childhood playing by the ocean,” Vivian said.

Eloise was hearing impaired from birth, and attended a private school for the deaf until the age of 18.

Her mother learned to lip read well, Vivian said. Today, Eloise is legally deaf and blind.

Eloise married lawyer Bob Dennistoun in 1930 and settled in Pasadena. The couple moved to Corona del Mar in 1950 when Bob’s health began to fail. Seeking an escape from the intense heat and smog, Vivian said, the couple returned to Eloise’s “beach roots.”

“In the summer, my mother went swimming daily at Big Corona, and late in the afternoon my parents would take a long walk around Corona del Mar. Hot tea and cookies always followed in the garden,” Vivian said.

After Bob’s death in 1980, Eloise befriended a group of young people who would meet her each afternoon by “her bench” overlooking the ocean at Inspiration Point. She was 72 then.

“Woe betide anyone who attempted to sit on that bench on weekday afternoons,” Vivian said.

The people in the group were in their late 20s, and they would come to watch the afternoon sunset.

“My mother loved talking to them. She was always much better with younger people, and they thought she was a wonderful, wise woman,” Vivian said.

Debby Beer, the activities director at Avalon by the Sea, described Eloise as a “spunky lady” who keeps to herself because she’s deaf, but “enjoys watching what goes by.”

“The staff [here] love her and have a lot of respect for her age, which is a milestone,” Beer said.

Before she moved to Avalon, Eloise had a special relationship with the Coco’s restaurant across the street from her home on Narcissus Avenue. While she was able, she walked there for lunch.

Once her eyesight began to fail, Coco’s came to her. Vivian arranged for the restaurant to deliver lunch to her mother every day at 4:30 for more than 10 years.

Cindy Yong, general manager at Coco’s in Corona Del Mar for the past seven years, said staff there described Eloise as “an incredible woman in her younger years.”

“She’s as sharp as can be,” Cindy said. “Her smile is infectious, and she has such a cute little laugh.”

SUE THOENSEN may be reached at (714) 966-4627 or at sue.thoensen@latimes.com.