Age has not managed to weary these magnificent centenarians
In the next few years, the last of those born from 1901 to 1924 will be gone. The Australian asked five centenarians what they believe will define them and their times | WATCH
In the next few years, the last of the Greatest Generation (born 1901–1924) will be gone, and the Silent Generation of Australians born from 1925 until the end of World War II will become our new elders. In this moment of transition, The Australian asked five centenarians what they believed would define them and their times.
World War II veteran Colin Wagener lives with his son on a 24ha property near Adelaide, where, at 106, he still enjoys riding his motorbike.
“I’ve done a lot with my life. My best memories are from 1927 when my parents took me to the opening of Parliament House in Canberra. I still have the invitation. You didn’t have as many luxuries then as they have now. My mother would have loved a washing machine. My father would have liked an automatic car.
My parents really gave me a flying start. For my 16th birthday, they gave me a motorbike – at the height of the Depression. I loved it, I was king of the road.
The Great Depression I know only too well. And of course, I copped World War II. It was a big thing and I was the perfect age. Four of us joined up in 1938, just part-time. I was full-time from 1939 and I was discharged in January 1946. So I copped it all.
After I left the army I didn’t want to know anything about it. The medals I was given stayed in their boxes for 65 years. Maybe it was PTSD? I’d had a gutful.
I tried to catch up afterwards. I went water skiing and snow skiing. I went to a car rally in Brisbane in 1955 and motels had just been invented on the Gold Coast. When I came back I built the first motel in Adelaide.
I like to think that I got more things right than I got wrong. In my mind I was always trying to make the most that I could out of life. And I reckon I did.”
Paula Bowman, 101, spent 30 years on a property in the Hunter Valley, NSW. She now lives independently in Sydney and only reluctantly gave up driving in July.
“We are the greatest generation. In spite of the war years, I still say we have lived the best time ever. I’ve got 10 grandchildren and 16 great-grandchildren and I don’t think they’re going to have it as good as I’ve had it.
There’s so much difficulty in life for the young today. From the age of five they’ve got to use a computer. But I suppose if I had been young today, I would have adapted to them.
I was brought up in England. It was the stiff upper lip. Nothing was too hard and if you had to do it, you have to do it. The war came when I was young and it altered my whole life. I was to go to finishing school and they wouldn’t let me go so then I joined the Red Cross. Nurses were in short supply so my friend and I did an abridged course and I became a nurse; we did what we had to do.
Everybody in Britain did something for the war effort. I had a brother who was 18 months older than me who was a fighter pilot and when he was killed it was devastating.
Being brought up in Yorkshire I was taught to do all the right things, carry on regardless. The war made me grow up quickly. It made you independent. I’m still independent. Until a few weeks ago I had been driving for nearly 90 years; the family moved my car and said I shouldn’t be driving at my age. But the RTA (Roads and Traffic Authority) was willing to give me another ten years. That was very amusing; I would have been 111 by the time it was finished.”
Melbourne’s Annetta Able, 99, was born in Subotica, Yugoslavia. She was with her late twin sister, Stepa, at Auschwitz and they were the only members of her family to survive the Holocaust.
“We didn’t have choices. There are so many opportunities for young people today: if you’re not good at something you can do something else. We just had to fly with the wind. We had to grab what was possible, and if we were good at it, good luck for us.
My sister Stepa and I started to work with children after the war and later we became nurses because we always wanted to help. I don’t know that I would think of us as hardworking. I just did what I had to do.
My life became somehow prearranged for me, not always according to my will. Times were quite hard and uneasy for many people because so many things were missing: peace, order, the nations were changing. Many people were afraid of the future.
My generation probably is very colourful – because there were wars, because there were so many events. If you think of what happened over the years, the technical progress, the history, so much machinery was invented to make life easier: when I was born a twin my mother couldn’t even have a pram with two seats.
Luck? Opportunities are what you look for, or you make them. People do that, not the times.”
Brisbane centenarian Stanley Fryer has been married for 64 years.
“I was 18 when I joined the army in February 1942 on the first Australian ambulance train, which formed in Brisbane. It had a doctor, six nursing sisters, pharmacists and a cook and about two dozen people like me who were called medical orderlies.
I don’t know why we were called that because we did very little medical work. We would pick up the walking wounded from New Guinea in Townsville and bring them down to hospital in Brisbane and Toowoomba. Our main job was to take meals to them.
There was a lot of compassion for those fellows who were coming back although they weren’t the most seriously wounded.
My generation was certainly hardworking – I spent most of my working life in a clerical position for an insurance company. We didn’t have all the problems that they seem to have with today’s generations. I think people were more tolerant with each other and respected their views.”
At 102, Archibald Prize winner Guy Warren is believed to be Australia’s oldest working artist. He has only recently reduced his output because of health issues.
“The last 102 years, most of which I can remember, have been like an old movie. I’ve seen it all before, the whole bloody lot, and it’s happening again.
I grew up in the Great Depression and I remember that too vividly, I think, because it affected my life and everyone else’s. It was the end of the Spanish flu, which I remember being talked about, and the Great War of 1914 to 1918 was still talked about, the evidence of which was still in front of you every time you saw an old soldier on crutches. And then the whole thing started off again with World War II. It’s the same old lousy movie.
The Great Depression made more of an impact than people now realise. I left school at 14 because my old man lost his job. That made a huge difference; I never got beyond the third year of high school. I would have loved to have stayed at school. My brother would have loved to have become a doctor but that wasn’t an option.
My generation couldn’t plan for the future. You were meant to stick your head down, your arse up and keep on working. It’s what one does. The Greatest Generation? I’ve never heard the term. I think we’ll be forgotten immediately when we drop off.”