Bronislawa Pesarczyk Holden or “B” as her friends and family call her, accepted the Boston Post Cane and celebrated her 105th birthday at Our Town Pizza in Peterborough on Friday.

Looking across the table at friends and family, “B” said she was happy. “It’s good to see all these nice people,” she said.

Selectman Joe Byk and Selectwoman Barbara Miller were there to bestow the honor of the Boston Post Cane. It is a New England tradition to give the cane to the oldest living resident in the town. Along with that accomplishment, she has also lived in Peterborough for 97 years.

The oldest of nine siblings, “B” was born in Bridgeport, Conn. on July 2, 1905. Her father, an attorney, and her mother, a housewife, emigrated from Poland to America around 1900, daughter Elaine Holden said. The family moved to a new town every two years before settling for good in Peterborough in 1913. After graduating from Emerson College she began a career as a modern and interpretive dancer.

“She danced all over New England,” Holden said about her mother.

She moved back to Peterborough when she married Peterborough native William Holden. World War II soon followed and they both did their part. William joined the Navy and “B,” after attending the University of Virginia to study electrical engineering, worked for the Navy in electrical aviation and experimental aircraft.

Soon after the war, she became pregnant with Elaine. “B” also had another daughter and son, but lost them in infancy. In 1950, the family moved from Vine Street to their newly built home on Elm Street, where she has lived ever since.

Holden said she has always thought of Elm Street as her home and was always home for weekends and summers as an adult. Then in 1984, while she was living in Nashua with her husband, Russell Gouveia, she learned she was pregnant. Holden said her father had passed away at that point and she and Gouveia decided to move in with “B.” It was a decision to live as a family, Holden said. “That was the most important thing that we were all together as a family. ... We sold everything and moved to be here with mom and raise our daughter in Peterborough.”

Now all grown up, lone granddaughter Adrianna Holden-Gouveia, who lives in Medford, Mass., with her husband, Colin Williams, was at the pizza parlor Friday to celebrate her grandmother’s birthday.

Holden said, “B” and her surviving siblings — sisters Mary, 102, of Palmer, Mass., Helen, 94 of Miami, Fla., and Pat, 93, of Bennington — are in a longevity study conducted by Boston University and Columbia University medical schools.

In that study, the researchers are finding that family and a sense of belonging and purpose is just as important if not more than genetics when it comes to living a long life, Holden said. “They are saying that community is really one of the important factors in growing old.”

It could very well be the key to her mother’s longevity, Holden said. These days it is too hard for “B” to attend Mass, but she was once a very active member of St. Peter Church on Vine Street and was a member of its woman’s guild, Holden said.

“She was very involved in the St. Peters Church for many years,” Holden said. “Volunteering is very important. It was always something that was expected in my family.”

When Holden and her husband are at work or can’t be with “B.” LNA Cricket Sullivan stays with her. Other than a little arthritis in her right knee, however, “B” has few medical complaints, Holden said. Aside from going to the hospital to give birth, “B” has only been hospitalized two other times in her life, Holden said — once when she was 17 to have her tonsils out and then when she was 94 for cataract surgery.

These days “B” enjoys listening to music, watching television and being read to, Holden said. “She was quite a reader. She just loves all kinds of books.”