100, BUT FEELS 60

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30945, 29 December 1965, Page 3

100, BUT FEELS 60

(N.Z. Press Association) TAURANGA, Dec. 28. According to a man who should know, a centenarian feels no different from when he was a mere 60.

Mr Walter Joseph Wintie, of Tara, near Waipu, who will celebrate his 100th birthday on January 8, would make few changes if e could start again. He has seen the advent of

cars, radios, international telephone calls, television, aircraft the atomic age and space travel and now hopes to live to see man land on the moon. “But to me the most amazing of all the new inventions,” he said, “is the way you can talk to a person in another country on the telephone. That’s a wonderful thing.” Mr Wintie begins his day at 6 a.m. when he listens to the world news in bed on his transistor radio and although he confesses that he sometimes goes back to sleep, he is always up by 9 o’clock. He reads the newspaper from first page to last without the assistance of glasses and takes pleasure in working in the garden of the farmhouse in which he lives with his daughter, Mrs J. F. Murray, and his two grandsons. “Until quite recently 1 used to do a bit of work on the farm, too,” he said.

Million A Month The 48,000,000 th vehicle to cross the Auckland harbour bridge went through the toll gates at 7 a.m. on Christmas Day—3l days after the 47,000,000 th. It is the first time 1,000,000 vehicles have crossed the bridge in a calendar month. The previous record was 34 days.—(P.A.)

I Born at Ruarangi, near , Whangarei, Mr WinUe moved I to Auckland before returning i to Ruarangi and finally movi ing to Tara, where he has lived for the last 70 years. As an engineer in the ship ■ Triumph, Mr Wintie sailed to the Australian goldfields when the gold rush began in 1886. “I wasn’t allowed to land, though.” he said, “because they thought I might not come back. I should have stayed, too. Thousands of acres of land that were thought to be worthless are now all farmland." He said he would never have left the sea if he had not married. Mr Wintie worked for some time oh the Auckland Harbour ferries, When he was chairman of the Mangawhai Road Board, Mr Wintie saw the construction of all the roads in the Mangawhai area. He is a member of the “good old days” clan. He said: “The old days were the best. People were more friendly then because there were nowhere near as many as there are now." A keen racegoer, Mr Wintie has seen the running of the Auckland Cup “for generations.” About 60 friends and relatives have been invited to a party at the farm on January 8 to celebrate his birthday.