CAPEL Sound resident Vivienne Massoni celebrated her 100th birthday on Friday 24 April.
Vivienne was born in Brighton on 24 April 1925, the daughter of William Tennyson and Stella Annie Forster (née Arbuthnot). Vivienne’s mother was born in Koondrook, Victoria, on the River Murray, where her father and grandfather founded the Arbuthnot Sawmill, a red gum sawmill that still operates today, celebrating 140 years of sustainable forestry.
Vivienne was schooled at Firbank Grammar and continued to a successful nursing career at the Royal Women’s Hospital in Melbourne.
She visited Portsea and Sorrento with her brother and sisters as a young woman and after marrying Marshall Gibson, began holidaying from their house in Diamond Bay. In the early 1950s, they built another house on Fisherman’s Beach Cutting and settled there until Marshall’s early death.
Vivienne later married Leon Massoni, a Melbourne restaurateur, and they worked together with their son, David, at Café Balzac, Tolarno French Bistro, Tolarno Two Brochettes, and Massoni Ristorante in Fitzroy Street, St Kilda, where Vivienne had a prominent front-of-house role.
The pull of the Mornington Peninsula never left Vivienne and during this period she returned to living in Portsea, where she was active in the community, shouldering projects like the naming of the Percy Cerutty Oval, the pétanque piste, and fifteen years with the Foreshore and other committees.
Relishing another challenge, Vivienne and Leon also established the Massoni Main Ridge vineyard in Red Hill where, as pioneers, they developed their local Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.
In retirement, Vivienne was a formidable linguist in her Scrabble group and a card sharp in Solo, always boasting a purse packed with five-cent pieces from her “winnings”.
She has recently moved into Regis in Capel Sound and is grateful for the care and attention from the staff.
Vivienne celebrated her milestone anniversary at the Sorrento Sailing and Couta Boat Club, with a few remaining old friends and her family of grandchildren and ten great-grandchildren.
First published in the Mornington News – 28 April 2026
