Delaware County celebrates its centenarians

The last year Kitty Bleyler and Alva Mullikin played field hockey for Upper Darby High School, the team won five, lost three, and tied one.

Not bad for "the two little shorties" who powered the attack from right and left wing, recalled Mullikin. Though they stood barely 5 feet high, the pair would race down the field, outpacing even their own teammates.

"Oh, those were the days," Kitty Bleyler, now Katherine Rann, recalled at a luncheon for centenarians in Delaware County. "I loved to run."

That was 81 years ago - and on Tuesday, Rann and Mullikin, both 99, got together for the first time since then at an event for centenarians sponsored by Delaware County Council and the county's Office of Services for the Aging.

Slowed by time and inhibited a bit by Rann's impaired hearing, the two teammates on the 1929 squad swapped statistics of the modern era.

"How old are you?" Rann asked Mullikin. "In October, I guess I'll be 100."

"You're one month older than I am," said Mullikin. "You're an old lady. And we're still getting smaller."

The backdrop for their reunion was the Drexelbrook Events Center in Drexel Hill, where a crowd of 235 gathered to fete Delaware County's centenarians. It was the eighth such luncheon.

Louis C. Colbert, who directs the office on aging, said the county identified 120 centenarians from its 550,000 residents. Of the 120, 47 attended. Last year, 30 of the 99 centenarians identified actually appeared, he said.

Colbert spoke about how different cultures revere their citizens who reach 100.

"In Japan, you get a silver cup and a certificate signed by the prime minister," he said. "In the Hindu countries, it is said if people touch the feet of their elders, they will live to be 100 years.

"In Delaware County, we throw you a party," he said to laughter from the audience.

The honorees, some walking on their own and others in wheelchairs, came wearing colorful dresses or Sunday-go-to-meeting suits. Many brought aides, friends, or family who served as helpers.

Mullikin came with her friend Janice Beale. For the past 10 years, Mullikin has lived at Lima Estates, a retirement facility in Middletown, Delaware County.

Rann was accompanied by her daughter-in-law Barbara Rann and her granddaughter, Jacqueline Rann, 24, all of Norwood. Rann has lived with her in-laws since the death of her husband more than a decade ago.

They led different lives: Mullikin trained at Peirce School of Business Administration and served as private secretary to a Boeing Co. executive before retiring. She had two children and was a Girl Scout leader in Springfield, where she lived.

Rann was a homemaker who raised one son and now has three grandchildren. She adored her pet cats. Despite failing eyesight and hearing, she has kept active.

Asked the secret to their longevity, Rann said she never drank or smoked.

"And she only ever told one lie," Barbara Rann said.

The lie had to do with her reason for leaving the dinner table many years ago. She claimed to be too full from eating a snack, but the real reason was that something at the table had disturbed her.

Mullikin said the secret to a long life is to savor each moment. Until last year, she grew and gave away the abundant tomato crop from her garden at Lima Estates. Now she leaves the gardening to others.

"Enjoy every day you're alive," she said. "Anything that happens, you live with it. You might as well accept it.

"I always said I'm going to live to be 100. I enjoy life. I really do."