FOR LONG LIFE

Evening Post, Volume CXIX, Issue 128, 1 June 1935, Page 21

FOR LONG LIFE

LONDON CLUB STRIVES

BEYOND THE CENTURY

"To inspire men and women with a desire to live on as able-bodied and clear-minded centenarians" is the high ambition of the Centenarians' Club, says ihe "Daily Express." The prime inspirer is the club's founder, Dr. Maurice Ernest, whose intensive study of longevity leads him to believe that Solomon's estimate of three score years and ten as the term for which man can live without weariness will probably be doubled before many generations have passed. . The first essential is to sift records, and thereby to separate doubtful from genuine centenarians. Therefore, Dr. Ernest wrote to "The Observer," London, to call in question the record of the Norwegian seaman Drakenberg, who, as a Norwegian correspondent of "The Observer" pointed out, is said, to have died in 1772 at the age of 145 years 10 months and some days. Dr. Ernest is not a centenarian. He looks, indeed, twenty years younger than his age. And the fact that many of the 6000 of 7000 members of his club in every part of the world are young men and women who, as he states,. "love life," convinces him that the desire to achieve the ideal of ablebodied and clear-minded centenarianism is far more widespread than might be imagined. But living and genuine centenarians are, of course, the club's most highly revered members. Some 120 have been made honorary members during the past five years. The actual centenarian strength of the club at any given date is difficult to determine. "Centenarians," said Dr. Ernest with a smile, "are a highly fluctuating community." The records of the 120, however, are lovingly documented,-many with letters and photographs, in the club's roll of honour. The oldest honorary member was, when she died, over 104. One a distinguished French doctor, writes with vigorous cheerfulness at the age of 102. ITS METHOD. The club pursues its ideal, in Dr. Ernest's words by "investigating means whereby health and vigour may be retained beyond the century," and by circulating "all available information on centenarianism." It is, in fact, a corresponding association rather than a meeting place for the centenarianminded, and its correspondents, according to Dr. Ernest, include, among others, biologists interested in the subject of longevity at universities "from Baku to Santiago de Chile." Dr. Ernest has the advantage over other members in that, although the club was founded only six years ago. he has been studying longevity for 30 years. His studies have led to the accumulation of some 600 volumes on the subject, from the treatise on old age in Aristotles "Parva Naturalia" to such rare and valuable books* as Gayton's "The Art of Longevity," and others more modern. They, have also involved him in "a terrific amount of work" to determine whether the 2000 centenarians (in r.ound figures) whose names have been recorded in the past were impostors or not. The goal .of his work has been the attempt to answer three questions— "What is the longest time any man have lived on earth?" "What' is. old age, and how can it averted or slowed down?" Methuselah apart, the answer to the first question will, Dr. Ernest thinks, surprise the world when it is revealed in his work on longevity, which will be published shortly. Without searching for arcanas or elixirs, every man, he claims, has it even today in his power to prolong his life, provided he observes certain simple rules of- living. ■ . __— -— —