SECRETS TO LONG LIFE FROM THOSE WHO REALLY KNOW

Since the first day humans realized they were aging, they've been looking for ways to stay young.

The search started with mythical fountains of youth and bizarre concoctions. Today we smear chemical compounds on our faces to prevent wrinkles and swallow endless streams of vitamins and protein drinks.

While those things may help, the experts -- folks who managed to live four score and seven years or so -- say they don't know how they lived so long.

-- T.J. Languell was born June 20, 1898, near Doniphan. His father was a blacksmith, but Languell didn't take up the trade. He moved around the country putting gas and oil lines into the ground.

One thing that probably helped lengthen his life was the U.S. government's failure to call him into service during two world wars. Languell had completed his physical and was nearly sent into service during World War II, but then it ended.

He outlived two wives and now takes care of himself, with only a walker slowing him down.

"I've done hard work all my life," Languell said. "I worked outside in all kinds of weather -- I wouldn't take a factory job."

He hasn't made any plans for his approaching 98th birthday but may have dinner with his daughter.

"That's a long way off when you're 98 years old," he said.

-- Walter Phillips was born Sept. 9, 1903, on Bainbridge Road, seven miles north of Cape Girardeau. Born into a farm family, he raised crops and livestock, supplementing his income with occasional auctioneering jobs -- 1,006 in 50 years, Phillips said.

Back in his farming days, he was up at 4 a.m., milking the cows and completing various other chores. Even after all these years, Phillips still can't sleep past 5 a.m.

Although he has experienced some heart trouble and his hearing is almost gone, Phillips drives himself to the Cape Girardeau Senior Center almost every day to work on puzzles and eat lunch with friends.

"I don't have any secret," he said. "I just give the good Lord credit. I'm here by the grace of God.

"I think vitamins help, because I take them. I try to eat healthy foods like the doctor tells me to, and I was never a smoker or a drinker."

-- Zadie Gerler was born in Alabama on Dec. 4, 1910. It was a Frohna boy who brought her to Missouri. They met on a train to California when he was in the military and she was a nurse on her way to visit her sister.

"I thought he was a flirt, because he got off and met some red-haired girl," Gerler said. "But then I ran into him again at the bus station, and he said he had been looking for me."

She was married from 1955 through 1993 and raised a son and a daughter. Each of her children also has a son and a daughter.

Gerler, like Languell, attributed her long, relatively healthy life to lots of hard work.

"We walked one-and-a-half miles to school," she said. "It was a hard life. When you washed, you had to scrub the clothes on a board."

Despite the testimonials, hard work may have little to do with the length of one's life.

Dr. Shelba Branscum, a professor and gerontology specialist at Southeast Missouri State University, said hundreds of studies and books point to the same factors that dictate longevity: genetics and lifestyles.

The best way to determine if someone will live a long time is to look at how old his parents or grandparents were when they died.

Then subtractions must be made for lifestyle choices. Smoking, eating red meat and refusing to wear a seat belt all are big minuses on the longevity chart.

However, being female, eating lots of fish and vegetables, and living in a cool, dry climate are big pluses.

"Companionship is another big factor," Branscum said. "Those folks who have good support systems around them, particularly in the form of lifetime commitments, live longer."

But when it comes to individuals, no chart truly can predict a lifespan.

"There are people who live on fat, drink and smoke heavily and live to be 120," Branscum said.

SURVIVAL PREDICTION TEST

from Vanderbilt University

A medical and nutritional researcher at Vanderbilt University, Dr. George V. Mann talks of his "survival predictor" that you can use to compute your projected age.

Admittedly somewhat unscientific, it has brought him no complaints -- those who don't survive aren't arround to complain and those who do outlive it are overjoyed. When asked why smoking wasn't included as a determining factor, he said that nobody should be doing that anymore.

Add up your figures and find your projected maximum age

- Parental ages at time of death -- the total number of decades each parent lived.

- Usual habibat -- urban, 5; suburban, 10; rural, 15.

- Physical activity - sedentary, 5; moderate, 10; active 15.

- Diet - slob, 5; moderate, 10; simple, 15.

- Alcohol -- alcoholic, 0; heavy, 5; medium, 10; non-drinker, 15.

- Body build -- large and fat, 0; medium, 10; lean and small, 15.

- Temperment -- mean, 5; tense, 10; placid 15.

- Total