Celebrating a Century
By Gary S. Hatrick
Zephyrhills Betmarian Victor Bryan celebrated his 100th year on this earth last month on October 4.
His birthday was marked with a celebration including family and friends and an official City of Zephyrhills proclamation designating that day as a day of celebration in honor of a long life well-lived for the newly-minted centenarian.
Bryan was born in 1925 in Sullivan County, located in the Catskill Mountains, the same county that 44 years later would become famous for Woodstock. Bryan, however, was born a bit to the north in Youngsville, N.Y., but in those years, it was right in the middle of dairy country.
The area was dotted with small dairy farms; Bryan’s father used to take his milk cans and keep them cool in a spring that ran under his house with access from the cellar. But life took a difficult turn for the youngster when he was seven. His father passed away at the age of 38 from a ruptured appendix. He had to learn to milk a cow and help his mother around the farm, along with his other siblings, while attending Youngsville Central School, the first centralized school in the State of New York, and taking the opportunity to play sports when he had the chance.
But life was about to shift again.
“The war came and changed just about everything,” Bryan said. World War I took a lot of farm boys away from the farms. “The boys all left, and I was too young,” he said. “I helped my mother, and the neighbor would need help too.”
However, the day came when he was old enough to go to war and everything was in order, but still another shift was coming.
“One of the draft board members came to the house and he said, “we gotta have somebody – farmers, stay home and produce stuff,’ and he said that there’s a farm that needs help, and he said I have a choice of going to that farm or go in the service,” he recalled. “My mother cried - my older brother, he was married and had a little guy, and they drafted him, because they drafted everybody. My mother said, ‘I’d rather have him stay home.’ So I worked for this farm. At first, I rode my bike, I guess it was about two miles away. My first paycheck, I bought an old car for $50. I worked there for three-and-a-half years and then, the war ended. The guy I've been working for, his brother was coming home, and I went to the draft board and told them, and they said, ‘well, we'll put you on another farm.’ and I said, no. So, I enlisted in the service.”
Bryan enlisted in the Army and was part of the occupational forces in Okinawa, Japan for 13 months. Duty was not difficult. Combat was over. “I always like to play sports and every week I played softball, and I was pretty good. We took the best players and played down in Manila and then we went up to Tokyo, but we lost one to nothin’,” he chuckled. “Then I got discharged.”
“I came home and met a new girl in town, and we got married,” he continued. Jane Everts was a teacher, and he was a school bus driver.
“We stayed with my mother, and that wasn't working,” he smiles. “We bought a farm. It was, of course, a dairy farm. “There were 23 farms in 11 miles,” he said. “It was all run down. The average dairy farm number of cows was between 20 and 40 cows. I started with eight cows and a team of horses. I just worked it little by little. The herd increased to about 30 head and I outgrew the farm.”
After a lifetime of dairy, he decided to change farms. He knew a man who was selling a farm that grew concord grapes, and he had apple trees. He bought the farm. He bulldozed the trees and enlarged the grape vineyard. He also bought some additional land. “I had 34 acres of grapes, I was growing five tons of grapes to the acre, so I had a lot of grapes. In five years, I had one of the best vineyards in the area. I made a pretty good living,” he said. During those days, he and Jane raised four children, two boys and two girls. He raised grapes until he retired.
Thirty-eight years ago, the Bryans moved to Betmar Acres in Zephyrhills. Jane had been a music teacher when she was teaching, and at Betmar she built up the Betmar “Kitchen Band,” which was a musical band made up of Betmar residents. “The Kitchen Band was her life,” Bryan said. They went to nursing homes, and performed at Christmas and on other occasions, and were a popular group. She died in 2002 and has a bench named in her honor at Clubhouse 3 in Betmar.
Bryan was busy volunteering around the park as well. One of his volunteer jobs was fetching golf balls out of the ponds along the golf course, washing them up, and sending them to the Golf Club to resell.
“We’d get in there, we rigged up a rake so that when you draw it along the golf balls would not fall off the side. Then we would throw them out of the pond, gather them up and bring them home and clean them in Clorox water, put them in egg cartons and sell them,” he said. He received a plaque and had one of three ponds named after him for his faithful efforts.
In 2004, Bryan married Doris Hammond of Betmar. They were together for 14 years when she passed away.
These days Bryan is staying at Solaris Healthcare Zephyrhills where he chose to go after he fell a few times in his home. He is cared for by his eldest daughter Connie Simoneau who is a Betmar resident.
Bryan is one of those people who have experienced so many changes, not only in life circumstances but in the way society lives. “From horse and buggy days to remote control tractors and from here to the moon,” he said. He is also concerned that younger people are relying too much on technology rather than interpersonal relationships. “I don't think people are as happy as they used to be, don't you think so?” he asked.
Of so many things that have changed, one thing never changed for him over the years. He never owned a credit card, always dealing with cash on the barrelhead. How many of us can say that?
Bryan said that the biggest challenge in life these days is loneliness. After all, when you are 100 years old, most of the people you grew up with and had close relationships with have gone and there are precious few left.
At 100 years old, he is alert, quick witted, has a good memory, and “gets life.” But he says, he is ready to be with his Lord. Tears glisten in his eyes as he quotes one of his favorite songs. “When you walk through the storm, hold your head up high, and don’t be afraid of the dark. Because at the end of the storm, there’s a golden sky.” He looks forward to that.
It will be a new life, after a long life, well lived.
