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Mr. Swan scuttles all notions about living
long and well
By Bill Whitaker
Fred Swan is living proof you need not embrace the early-to-rise
lifestyle to become healthy, wealthy and wise.
Just the other day, Fred left his comfortably immaculate, upper-middle-class
home in northwest Abilene to dispense wit and wisdom at his 95th
birthday -- and he was late arriving at that.
Up till midnight or beyond, he seldom rises before the sun
has climbed high in the sky. He breakfasts when others are thinking
of lunch. Neighbors sometimes pick the Reporter-News off his driveway
and toss it on his porch, lest some stray dog steal it before
Fred's finally ready to read it.
This time of year makes Fred's heart quicken, though. Besides
the fact his birthday is in December, today marks his 59th wedding
anniversary to wife Tressie. Almost as important, a few days from
now brings Fred another year closer to a cherished goal. "I
worked for International Harvester for 37 years and my goal is
to live in retirement just as long," he told me during his
party. "Well, I retired Dec. 31, 1967, so I've still got
a few more years to go. But I'm doing pretty good as it is.
"I've been on the payroll 30 years now without doing a
tap of work, so it's an ideal situation."
Granted, as witty in word and sure in footing as Fred is, he
was attending his birthday party at Hendrick Medical Center's
pulmonary rehab division, where Fred received treatment for pulmonary
fibrosis a couple of years ago.
But while some of Fred's fellow graduates of the successful
and still relatively new program still require oxygen for chronic
respiratory woes, Fred -- older than any of them -- moved freely
among them the other day, and under his own steam. Still Fred
-- who has no children of his own -- showed plenty of understanding
for the others assembled, many of them young enough to be his
children: "Shame we all had to get ill to get together."
Fred's wit is no doubt inherited. He enjoys talking about his
grandfather, Clark E. Swan,who hailed from New York, fought in
the Union Army of Northern Virginia in the Civil War under Ulysses
S. Grant and later moved to Iowa, where, his wife complained,
he lost all his polished New York manners.
"She complained about being out there in Iowa and roughing
it and how he wasn't keeping up with his manners, either,"
Fred said. "A few days after they got there, she began correcting
him on how he was eating -- which fork to use and all that."
When Grandfather Swan left Iowa briefly to go to Washington
for a soldiers' reunion hosted by President Grant, he cabled a
wire back to his wife: "Having fine time. Visited with president
but am only one here with manners."
Fred, too, hails from New York and likewise lived for a while
in Iowa, where he got a job with International Harvester. His
many years with the company eventually brought him to the Southwest,
including Sweetwater and Abilene.
Although he worked his way up into management, he said the
work was too hard there, so he got into into sales.
"Personally, I feel sorry for men who want to be president
of the company or chairman of the board," he told hospital
staffers at his birthday party. "The work's too hard -- and
hard work killed more men than alcohol ever did."
Fred told those half his age to "live to enjoy retirement.
"Don't work hard," he said. "I hired three men
who turned out to be my boss later on and they're all dead, and
they've been dead for at least 10 years."
So much for encouraging words about climbing up the ladder
and working hard all your life.
At one point, Fred told 26-year-old audiologist Jennifer Thomson
how pretty men young and old found her, then reminded her that
"if you don't work hard, they'll still be looking at you
when you're my age."
Fred also stressed the importance of material things. He likes
telling folks how he won over his wife only because he promised
her a long honeymoon -- and he says he might not have secured
her attention at all if he hadn't had a good set of wheels at
his disposal.
"I bought a Packard, a black, '37 Packard with one wheel
mounted on the fender and a hood on it as big as this table,"
he said. "I think the Packard had something to do with it.
The rest of the guys were on foot!" Fred says he knew he'd
found the right soul mate when they were wrapping up a vacation
in New Mexico in 1939 and, low on cash, he offered Tressie two
choices: They could either buy a bottle of scotch, enjoy themselves
and sleep in the car or put what little cash they toward a motel
room.
Tressie chose the first option.
And so, another illusion about what it takes to lead a long
and healthy life went quietly into the dustbin of time.
Although Bill Whitaker intends to play Grinch the rest of this
holiday week and not answer the phone at work, you can leave a
message for him at 676-6732.
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Copyright ©1996 or
1997, Abilene Reporter-News / Texnews / E.W. Scripps. Publications
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