Meet Amy Cook one of the very first international business people ever to step foot in Bermuda. Before Ace and XL, before the Hamilton skyline was dotted with construction cranes, there was petite Ms Cook and her mechanical adding machine.She arrived in 1947 aboard an oil tanker with the Shell Petroleum Company Ltd to help set up their British expatriate pension fund which eventually became Shell Trust (Bermuda) Ltd.While originally contracted to work here for only two years, Mrs Cook (née Licence) ended up staying, marrying a Bermudian and working for Shell Trust Bermuda for 40 years. She is the longest-serving Shell employee in Bermuda.The office was created so that Shell's pension fund could invest worldwide. In the 1940s, the UK had severe restrictions on foreign investment, and in order to give the company the opportunity to invest around the world, Bermuda was chosen as the jurisdiction in which to be based.Shell Trust Bermuda was one of the first international companies to set up shop on the Island around the same time as insurance company American International. Today, the pension administrator manages billions of dollars over three pension funds.Along with two other women, Mrs Cook was selected as the original convoy to Bermuda to do bookkeeping, administration and clerical work. Eventually 27 women would relocate to the Island.They brought everything with them, including their sumlock machines a mechanical precursor to the modern-day calculator and even the office furniture, including red leather couches and chairs that reside in the reception area to this day.Born in the suburbs just outside London in 1921, she started her career at Lloyds Bank in the capital.She then moved over to Shell, getting her certification at the National Cash Register School at the same time. After a year at the firm, she stepped aboard the ship to Bermuda.The nonagenarian has a remarkable memory even recalling the name of the tanker she arrived on: Neverita and its captain: Captain Rumbelow.She clearly remembers the trepidation of sailing into the unknown as the three women had little prior knowledge of Bermuda.“We didn't know what we were coming to,” she said, adding that the crossing took 10 days in stormy weather. “It was a rough trip.”Mrs Cook recalls that Shell Trust Bermuda started in an office on the corner of Woodbourne Avenue, eventually moving to the Vallis Building and then to Ferry Reach. Today, the office is in the JLT Building on Cedar Ave.“When I first came to Bermuda there were no cars, just a little train running through Front Street,” she recalls. “We brought our pushbikes from London and that's how I met my husband because we cycled past Heyl's Drugstore every day where he was a pharmacist.”She married Bermudian Leighton Cook in 1954 and had a son, Brian. She now has three grandchildren who live in Canada.Mrs Cook retired from her position of senior administrator after 40 years of service in July 1986. As a matriarchal figure at the firm, the company has always celebrated important milestones in her life.Last week, Shell threw a small birthday party for Mrs Cook, who turned 90 in April. At the party, she wore her shell earrings and gold pendant that the company gave her in 1997, showing her pride in her former employer.Attending the party was Bob Stewart, vice-president of Shell Trust Board, who was the country chairman of Bermuda for 13 years.“Not many Shell employees make it to 90 and Amy, being one of the first employees at the company here in Bermuda, this is an opportunity to give her the true recognition for the success of this company,” Mr Stewart said.