The Legend of Harry Widener

In a recent column on notable graduation speeches, I mentioned one delivered by former U.S. Senator Barney Frank to his fellow Harvard grads.

“When I was here there was still a requirement that students had to swim 50 yards to graduate … because Harry Elkins Widener had drowned with the sinking of the Titanic,” Frank said. “And it made me very grateful at the time that he had not gone down in a plane crash.”

A fuuny line, to be sure.   But what's this about a swimming requirement?

Is it true that Harvard students, the cream of the American educational system, the alleged embodiment of intellectual and physical refinement, really had to swim 50 yards before the dean handed them a diploma?   

And was the Titanic to blame?

Surely a U.S. senator would not engage in hyperbole.

Reader Pat Brunette (Harvard-Radcliffe, 1965) confirmed that, indeed, the 50-yard swim was once a graduation requirement:

“My strongest memory of this enchanting obligation is of not being allowed out of the pool until 11:50 a.m., having to dry off, dress, and struggle through a mile or so of snow drifts (which, of course get deeper each year I get older), to my next class, George Wald’s biology class, which started at noon. If Professor Wald ever noticed me at all, I was the one straggling in late once a week, with frozen wet hair, sitting on the stairs because his was a popular course and all the seats were taken by noon.”

She added:

“Whoever thought being able to swim for fifty yards would have saved (Harry Elkins Widener) from sinking with the Titanic must have been a bit of an optimist, but I’d like to read more about it.”

And so you shall, Ms. Brunette.

This much is true: Mr. Widener, along with his father, perished when the Titanic sunk. His mother survived.

Alas, the rest is all wet.

The legend holds that, to ensure no other Harvard man would share her son’s fate, Eleanor Widener insisted that future graduates be required to demonstrate an ability to swim. “Among the many myths relating to Harry Elkins Widener, this is the most prevalent,” says the Harvard University Library’s “Ask a Librarian” service.

“A review of records in the Harvard Archives indicates that there have been swimming requirements at various times in Harvard history, but none were related in any way to Mr. Widener or the gift of the library to Harvard by his mother ... In his 1980 publication [on Widener Library], Harvard historian William Bentinck-Smith wrote, “There is absolutely no evidence in the President’s papers, or the faculty’s, to indicate that [Harry Widener’s mother] was, as a result of the Titanic disaster, in any way responsible for [any] compulsory swimming test.”‍

That doesn’t necessarily ruin a good story, however.

As recently as two years ago, many schools still had the compulsory swimming requirement, among them MIT, Columbia, Bryn Mawr, Washington and Lee, Dartmouth and Notre Dame.

And like Harvard, the test has become the stuff of legends.

One such tale holds that during the 1920s, Oregon State University had such a requirement, and Linus Pauling, who would go on to win two Nobel Prizes, could not swim a stroke. It was rumored that someone donned his number and swam for him.

At Columbia, campus lore has it that a university president wanted to ensure students’ survival if Manhattan ever sank — but since engineering students could build a boat, they were exempt.

A Washington and Lee University spokesman told the Wall Street Journal that a school president from the 1910s lamented “the idleness and restless shallowness of the average undergraduate,” but it is unclear whether swimming specifically was seen as the remedy for youthful malaise. The school’s test now asks students to swim 50 yards in one minute, and then spend five minutes treading water.

At all-female Bryn Mawr, the swim requirement dates at least to 1909, said a spokesman, noting that an archivist found a clipping in the personal papers of the then-athletic director mentioning that “American mermaids are known for their hardiness and fine physiques.”

Dr. Mortimer J. Adler, who earned a PhD from Columbia University, wrote more than 30 books, taught at Columbia and was chairman of the board of editors of the Encyclopedia Britannica, was denied his bachelor’s degree by Columbia in 1923 — despite his completing their four-year curriculum in three years and finishing at the top of his class — because he failed to pass the swimming test required for graduation.

He was finally granted his degree 60 years later after informing Columbia that he had since learned how to swim and asking them to waive his disqualification.

Robert Rector is a veteran of 50 years in print journalism. He has worked at the San Francisco Examiner, Los Angeles Herald Examiner, Valley News, Los Angeles Times and Pasadena Star-News. He can be reached at Nulede@Aol.Com.

Words Worth Hearing

“I could have said something profound, but you would have forgotten it in 15 minutes — which is the afterlife of a graduation speech.” — Art Buchwald.

It’s graduation season, that time of year when a generation that made a mess of the world exhorts the next generation to go forth and clean it up.

Of course, the older generation was also encouraged to spread peace and prosperity but somehow fumbled the ball out of the end zone. As did the generation before that. And before that.

Maybe if someone actually paid attention to graduation advice, the cycle might be broken.

That’s a lot to ask. Graduation day is not the best time to expect an eager and receptive audience. It’s a day for celebrating, not navel gazing.

For example, one of our daughters “walked” in high school, twice in college, once in law school and once when she was sworn into the bar.

And each and every ceremony that I sat through was accompanied by a speech in which grads were wished well in the real world and encouraged to do their best.

Aside from the general tone of the remarks, I remember absolutely nothing. Not one word.

I offer no excuse except for the fact that I was so caught up in the moment and awash in pride that Lincoln himself could have materialized to recite the Gettysburg Address and I would been mentally and emotionally otherwise occupied.

So shame on me. Because there are inspiring words being spoken at graduation ceremonies throughout the land that are worth hearing.

One my favorites, from a writer named Nelson Henderson, was profound in its simplicity. “The true meaning of life is to plant trees under whose shade you do not expect to sit.”

There are plenty more.

“Responsibility to yourself means that you don’t fall for shallow and easy solutions — it means that you refuse to sell your talents and aspirations short.” — Adrienne Rich, Douglass College.

“Truth eludes us if we do not concentrate our attention totally on its pursuit.” — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Harvard University.

“Try putting your iPhones down every once in a while and look at people’s faces.” — Amy Poehler, Harvard.

“I graduated in 1989, and I’d focused almost entirely on the Soviet Union and communism … so when the Berlin wall fell, I was, well, I was screwed.” — Anderson Cooper, Tulane University.

“… our challenge is to live the final stanza of a song you have heard or sung hundreds of times … land of the free and the home of the brave!” — Anita L. Defrantz, Connecticut College.

“Just remember, you can’t climb the ladder of success with your hands in your pockets.” — Arnold Schwarzenegger, USC.

“When I was here there was still a requirement that students had to swim 50 yards to graduate … because Harry Elkins Widener had drowned with the sinking of the Titanic. And it made me very grateful at the time that he had not gone down in a plane crash.” — Barney Frank, Harvard.

“So the mission of … every empowered person in the world in this time has to be to build up the positive and reduce those negative forces of our interdependence.” — Bill Clinton, Yale University.

“Don’t let complexity stop you. Be activists. Take on the big inequities. It will be one of the great experiences of your lives.” — Bill Gates, Harvard.

“So, what’s it like in the real world? Well, the food is better, but beyond that, I don’t recommend it.” — Bill Watterson, Kenyon College.

“Life is too challenging for external rewards to sustain us. The joy is in the journey.” — Bradley Whitford, University of Wisconsin.

“Despite difficulties, always keep optimism. ‘I can overcome these difficulties.’ That mental attitude itself will bring inner strength and self-confidence.” — The Dalai Lama, Tulane.

“You are not special. You are not exceptional. Contrary to what your soccer trophy suggests, your glowing seventh grade report card, despite every assurance of a certain corpulent purple dinosaur, that nice Mister Rogers and your batty Aunt Sylvia, no matter how often your maternal caped crusader has swooped in to save you … you’re nothing special.” — David McCullough Jr., Wellesley High School.

“Now I usually try not to give advice. Information, yes, advice, no. But, what has worked for me may not work for you. Well, take for instance what has worked for me. Wigs. Tight clothes. Push-up bras.” — Dolly Parton, University of Tennessee.

“In the perspective of infinity, our differences are infinitesimal.” — Fred Rogers, Dartmouth College.

“Yesterday is gone, tomorrow may never come, but as long as we have today, we can change the world.” — Glenn Beck, Liberty University.

“So how do you know what is the right path to choose to get the result that you desire? And the honest answer is this. You won’t.” — Jon Stewart, College of William and Mary.

“Do a lot of spitting out the hot air. And be careful what you swallow.” — Theodore “Dr. Seuss” Geisel, Lake Forest College.

And finally:

“Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.” — Yoda, a galaxy far, far away

Robert Rector is a veteran of 50 years in print journalism. He has worked at the San Francisco Examiner, Los Angeles Herald Examiner, Valley News, Los Angeles Times and Pasadena Star-News. He can be reached at Nulede@Aol.Com.

Enough Said

His Cash Is Trash

One of the things I am truly grateful for today is that the so-called “philanthropist” who recently decided it would be fun to stash cash around town, then use Twitter to hint about its whereabouts, is long gone. Forever, we hope.

His antics caused near riots in some locations, led on by grinning media cheerleaders who busily compiled plenty of material to fill their news budgets.

We didn’t know his identity at the time. So in honor of the medium he used to advance his message, let’s call him Mr. Twit.

When we last looked in on his handiwork in Burbank, hundreds of people were rummaging through the streets looking for envelopes of cash. Not a lot of cash, just a hundred bucks or so.

Videos posted online showed people running through traffic, swarming a bus stop and combing bushes in search of three envelopes hidden at various spots at the Empire Center in Burbank, according to media reports. At one point, a woman abandoned her car in the street to join in the hunt.

What jolly fun. I hope Mr. Twit left an envelope at the Burbank Police Department to reward the efforts that were required to bring order to this chaos.

The Burbank episode was followed by one in Hermosa Beach characterized by one observer as “pandemonium.”

No one has been seriously injured yet. But keep it up, Mr. Twit, and it will be just a matter of time before some goofball with a gun will feel justified in defending his new-found stash by any means necessary.

Mr. Twit described himself as a real estate developer, and said the scavenger hunt was his attempt to pay it forward after scoring a six-figure profit on a property deal, and hoped others would do the same.

What a good idea. Let’s all celebrate our good fortune by stashing a few twenties in an envelope and alerting thousands of people about it via social media. Better yet, let’s do it on a Monday when the city is already choked with traffic. If we’re lucky, we might be able to see a few fist fights take place, maybe even a felony or two.

We aren’t the first city to be blessed by Mr. Twit’s largesse.

He first began hiding envelopes filled with cash in San Francisco. When his movement picked up steam, he moved on to San Jose before bringing his act to Los Angeles.

Imitators have popped up nationwide.

People looking for the cash in Wichita damaged railroad signage while looking for their treasure. Just after midnight Sunday the person behind the account tweeted this frustrated message: “damage like this does not accidentally happen #lostfaith.”

That person didn’t want to do an interview, but over email said they were thinking about suspending the account, saying “the fun is quickly slipping away.”

In Dallas, one observer noted that people “were running into traffic for $25 in an envelope. Absolutely insane.”

And it didn’t take long for scam artists to get involved. In San Antonio, a copycat of the Hidden Cash scavenger hunt craze is asking people to donate money to be hidden around the city. Hide your wallets, folks.

For his part, Mr. Twit says “I want the public to know that this is meant to be a fun way to put a smile on people’s faces.”

But then the smile disappeared from his face when he warned, “If you are struggling financially, please look to the many business opportunities that are out there to help yourself.

“There are people making money every day in all kinds of businesses, from e-commerce to exporting almonds (I know a guy who makes about $1 million a year doing this) to real estate.

“Hidden Cash is not going to save you, the lottery is not going to save you. Be smart and responsible and research all the ways to make money that are out there…”

But Mr. Twit doesn’t understand his audience. People who dash into traffic to find a hundred bucks live in a world where e-commerce and million dollar nut businesses are often beyond their reach.

In Burbank, 14-year-old Tatiana Ramirez told KTLA that the $210 in her envelope couldn’t have come at a better time.

“We were having lots of problems with money and my grandma was in the hospital, and I was going to help her with her medication,” she said.

A guy in San Francisco simply took all his friends out for pizza. Another said he would buy something nice for his mom.

Sergio Loza, 28, a San Francisco security guard who found an envelope with $50 inside taped to a parking meter, said he spent $30 on clothes for his 2-year-old niece’s birthday and gave her the remaining $20 as well.

That’s the real meaning of paying it forward. Media circus ringmasters like Mr. Twit should take note. And the next bus out of town.

Robert Rector is a veteran of 50 years in print journalism. He has worked at the San Francisco Examiner, Los Angeles Herald Examiner, Valley News, Los Angeles Times and Pasadena Star-News. He can be reached at Nulede@Aol.Com.

A Bumpy Road to the Future

It is the stuff of science fiction.

You have errands to run, a friend to visit, a concert or a baseball game to attend.

You slide into your car and punch in the destination. It is the last driving decision you will make during the trip.

You own a driver-less car. It has no steering wheel, no gas nor brake pedal. It will take you to your destination, leave on its own to find a parking space, then return to pick you up when you summon it.

During your journey, you can read a book, take a nap, have a cocktail. Nothing is required of you except, I suspect, to have the kind of money it will cost to afford this kind of sophisticated technology.

This is no 22nd Century scenario. The technology exists now. Several automotive manufacturers — BMW, Mercedes, Volvo, Nisan, Toyota, GM and Ford among them — plan to introduce vehicles with autonomous capabilities in the next few years.

Experts predict that by 2035, most self-driving vehicles will be operated completely independent from a human occupant’s control.

In the meantime, four electric autonomous vans successfully drove 8,000 miles from Italy to China in 2010. The vehicles were developed in a research project backed by European Union funding by the University of Parma, Italy.

That same year, a driver-less Audi reached the 14,000-foot summit of Pikes Peak in 27 minutes. A Prius modified by Google successfully managed the famously twisty Lombard Street in San Francisco along with the Golden Gate Bridge.

Google made a splash on the social media circuit this past week by showing off its version of the driver-less car. They were prototypes but they met the most important requirement of the autonomous vehicle: They operated entirely on their own.

In a short film clip, various passengers were given a demonstration ride. All responded with enthusiasm. The most intriguing was a blind man who spoke of the “big part of my life that would be brought back to me” with such a vehicle.

So this all good news, right? The future belongs to us. After all, robots drive better than people, accidents would decline along with the number of traffic cops, ambulance-chasing attorneys and the cost of insurance, drunk driving would be marginalized and gas mileage would improve.

But there are more than a few bumps in the road.

Jonathan Swift once observed, “He was a bold man that first ate an oyster.” Who among us wants to be the bold man who trusts a driver-less machine to safely transport his family? It’s kind of like the first guy to try the parachute. Everyone says it should work, but….

Highways are dangerous places, full of speeders, red-light runners, jaywalkers, road ragers, people with a belly full of booze or a head full of dope. Unless every driver on the road is in a driver-less car, the dangers are great even with collision avoidance and GPS systems.

Which leads me to believe that the earliest generations of these cars will provide the security of a steering wheel and brake pedal. At least any one that I’m riding in.

And much as I appreciate the genius and dedication of the engineers who are bringing this phenomenon to pass, I can’t help but dwell on the auto industry’s record on safety and its decided lack of ethics.

General Motors, for example, has already recalled more cars and trucks in the U.S. this year than it has sold here in the five years since it filed for bankruptcy, according to CNN. Since that filing in June 2009, GM has sold 12.1 million vehicles in the United States. Total U.S. recalls: 13.8 million.

Chief among them was 2.6 million of its small cars due to faulty ignition switches, which could shut off the engine during driving and thereby prevent the air bags from inflating. At least 13 deaths have resulted from the flaw which had been known to GM for at least a decade but never publicized prior to the recall being declared.

Of course, that doesn’t touch Ford that once famously recalled 21 million vehicles from 10 model years for a problem that caused some vehicles to slip from park into reverse. Records show Ford’s solution for that problem, which investigators linked to 6,000 accidents and nearly 100 deaths, was to send drivers a warning sticker to put on the dashboard.

Then there’s Ford’s famous Pinto. Before the car ever reached the market, concerns emerged that a rear-end collision might cause the Pinto to blow up — the positioning of the fuel tank sparked fears it could be punctured in a crash and cause a fire or an explosion. But instead of fixing the Pinto’s design, Ford determined it would be cheaper to settle any lawsuits resulting from the car’s flaws.

Are these the people I want to whisk me away on a robotic magic carpet?

There are other issues, of course. Who’s liable in an accident if nobody is driving? These cars are products of computer software. What if you car’s system was hacked and your car is stolen? With you in it. Or someone thinks it would be funny to send you off the Santa Monica pier?

According to one published report, autonomous cars relying on lane markings cannot decipher faded, missing, or incorrect lane markings. Markings covered in snow, or old lane markings left visible can hinder autonomous cars’ ability to stay in lane. Given the state of this country’s infrastructure, that could take a lot of paint.

It would seem as though a lot of real-world problems need to be solved before we run, checkbook in hand, down to our local robo-car dealer.

If and when they are, it will be a fascinating leap forward into the future.

Go Figure

There are several undeniable truths about statistics:   First and foremost, they can be manipulated, massaged and misstated. In the immortal words of Homer Simpson, “Aw, you can come up with statistics to prove anything…Forty percent of all people know that.”

Second, if bogus statistical information is repeated often enough, it eventually is considered to be true.

As to Point One, consider a presidential debate.  In 2012, when Barack Obama and Mitt Romney squared off, the President was heard to declare that "Over the last 30 months, we've seen 5 million jobs in the private sector created."

But 30 months only dates back to January 2010. And the president took office in January 2009.   It turns out that in his first year in office, the country lost some 5 million jobs. While things got better, the cumulative job creation in the private sector during Obama's first term is in fact a more humble 125,000.

Romney, for his part, said that "If I'm president I will create -- help create 12 million new jobs in this country with rising incomes."  While that may have seemed impressive,   it's the exact same figure that had been used by economic forecasters for how many jobs they already expected the economy would add over the next four years given a stable economy. And it had nothing to do with who was in the White House. 

As to Point Two, consider these Things We Believe But Shouldn’t: 

The teen pregnancy rate is on the rise.   No, it isn’t.   According to a report in the Washington Post, the teen pregnancy rate in 2009, of about 38 per thousand girls, was 39 percent lower than the 1991 peak of 62.  Just four years later, in 2012, it reached a record low of about 29.

People only use 10 per cent of their brains:   Nobody knows for sure where this nugget came from, but as psychologist Scott Lilienfeld explains: “The last century has witnessed the advent of increasingly sophisticated technologies for snooping in the brain’s traffic... Despite this detailed mapping, no quiet areas awaiting new assignments have emerged. In fact, even simple tasks generally require contributions of processing areas spread throughout virtually the whole brain.” Which means you’re using all of your brain, even if you don’t feel like it on occasion.

Men think about sex every seven seconds: Calculated over 16 waking hours that adds up to 8,000 salacious thoughts in a day. While we’ve know a few guys who met or maybe even exceeded that mark, a 2011 Ohio State study found that young men think about sex 19 times a day, compared with 10 for young women.

We’re discussing all of this because of the emergence of one Tyler Vigen, a law school student at Harvard, who has once and for all exposed just how absurd statistical data can be in the wrong hands.

He has created a website called Spurious Correlations (found at tylervigen.com) which, he says, isn’t meant to create a distrust for research or even correlative data but instead foster interest in statistics and numerical research.  Perhaps.   We prefer to think he has a wicked sense of humor. 

Using data from the Center for Disease Control and the U.S. Census, he intertwines the numbers to reaches statistical conclusions which are based on real data but which have to actual correlation whatsoever.  

In his first example, he has illustrated in graph form that the number of people who trip and fall over their own feet is in direct correlation with the number of lawyers in Nevada.   

Next up is a chart that show the number of people murdered by being pushed from high places corresponds with the precipitation in Tuscola County, Mississippi.

Vigen has showed that the age of our Miss Americas declines in concert with the number of murders by steam, hot vapors and hot objects.

Then we are shown that the number of sociology doctorates awarded is in direct proportion to the number of deaths caused by anticoagulants.

By the same measurement, we find that the per capita consumption of mozzarella cheese is in statistical lockstep with civil engineering doctorates awarded.

More intriguing is the chart that illustrates that the number of people who drowned by falling into a swimming pool correlates with the number of films in which Nicolas Cage has appeared.

Where else would you find that the letters in the winning word of the Scripps National Spelling Bee correlates with the number of people killed by venomous spiders.

Or that the total number of political actions committees in the U.S. is matched by the number of people who died falling out of their wheelchair.

All of which recalls the remark from American humorist Evan Esar that statistics is the science of producing unreliable facts from reliable figures.

Send In the Clowns

Don’t blink.

If you do, you might miss the California primary election, which will take place on Tuesday, June 3

Miss it and you won’t be alone. According to one analyst, a 25 percent turnout would not be improbable.

This wasn’t supposed to happen. In 2012, voters approved a new primary system, in which the top two vote-getters advance to the general election regardless of political party. It was intended to encourage greater turnout. It has not.

Lest we conclude that our fellow citizens of the Golden State are a bunch of knuckle-dragging, gimlet-eyed know-nothings, consider that a Gallup poll released this past week found that just 35 percent of registered voters nationwide are more excited than usual about voting in November’s midterm elections.

Breaking news? Hardly. Midterm elections generally generate a lot less enthusiasm than those in a presidential year. The 35 percent who said they are “more excited” are probably candidates, their family members, party apparatchiks and bumper sticker manufacturers.

Then there is this factor: Thanks to the 2012 elections and the never-ending slugfest between President Obama and the loyal opposition, Americans are suffering from a major case of political battle fatigue. And they intend to take a nap.

Too bad. Those who have decided to sit this one out are missing out on a veritable parade of — how shall we say it — unique personalities who reveal themselves on this year’s sample ballot.

Take the governor’s race. Incumbent Jerry Brown has an approval rating of nearly 60 percent among registered voters, according to a recently released Field poll.

So who’s lined up to take on this formidable opponent?

Republicans include Glenn Champ, a registered sex offender who spent more than a decade in state prison, convicted of crimes including voluntary manslaughter and assault with intent to commit rape. He explains that he “found the Lord when I got arrested for picking up the prostitutes.”

Also running is Tim Donnelly, is a state assemblyman from Twin Peaks and a Tea Party favorite. To call him a firebrand might be soft-selling it a bit.

When first elected to the Legislature, he announced that “I’m going there to reach across the aisles to the enemies of freedom and annihilate them and pound them into the ground and take back our power.”

Shortly afterward, he was caught by airport security with a loaded handgun registered to an 83-year-old woman.

He certainly stands up for his beliefs, calling for stricter immigration measures and more liberal gun laws. But in a state with a largely Democratic legislature and one that historically has voted for a Democratic presidential candidate, he might find it useful to be moderate in word and deed. He doesn’t have to mean it. After all, he’s a politician.

Donnelly’s chief rival is Neel Kashkari, a former U.S. Treasury Department official whose social views — he supports same-sex marriage — are more moderate.

Donnelly recently ran afoul of his own party leadership for suggesting Kashkari supported the United States submitting to the Islamic, Shariah banking code.

However, Kashkari is Hindu, not Muslim. An honest mistake. We all know that people with funny-sounding names are extremists.

Other gubernatorial candidates include Janel Buycks, a nonpartisan minister from Lakewood, who claims she has Jesus Christ’s endorsement. And then there’s Democrat Akinyemi Agbede, a Fresno doctoral student and self-proclaimed “super-genius” who wants to ensure that “the beautiful smiling faces of the people of California will forever be permanent.”

Who should appear in the Attorney General contest but Orly Taitz. Perhaps you would might best remember her as the Queen of the Birther Movement.

Among many other things, Taitz alleges that President Obama is not a natural-born citizen of the United States and is therefore ineligible to serve as president. She claims he was born in Kenya and that he falsified his Selective Service papers and his application to the Illinois bar.

“I believe (Obama) is the most dangerous thing one can imagine, in that he represents radical communism and radical Islam: He was born and raised in radical Islam, all of his associations are with radical Islam, and he was groomed in the environment of the dirty Chicago mafia. Can there be anything scarier than that?”

Well, yes, Orly. Guess who?

She is one of seven candidates, including incumbent Kamala D. Harris.

Now on to the judicial selections. Let’s face it, few know anything about the candidates for the bench. Many folks skip the entire category when voting.

But what’s interesting here is the occupations of the candidates for judge of the Superior Court. In 15 races, the candidates listed their profession as sex crimes prosecutor, child molestation prosecutor, gang homicide prosecutor, criminal gang prosecutor, government corruption prosecutor, sexual predator prosecutor, gang murder prosecutor, major narcotics prosecutor and violent crimes prosecutor.

How many lawyers does it take to prosecute the scum of the earth? Apparently a lot.

And while there may be a bit of hyperbole at work here, it’s ultimately a sad comment on our society.

Blood Lust

“Young blood….I can’t get you out of my mind.” — The Coasters, 1957

Want to live to be 100?  Or beyond?

I’m not sure I want to hit three figures on the birthday scale unless I’m assured of a sound mind and body. As we have all learned, however, life doesn’t come with a guarantee.

Besides, not even the godfather of fitness, Jack LaLanne, could make it to that milestone. And my lifestyle falls somewhat short of his Spartan existence.

So I won’t be packing my roller blades when I get sent off to the elder shelter. A nice pair of slippers will do.

Then there’s the fact that the Century Club is pretty much ladies only. According to the U.S. Census, 81 per cent of centenarians are women.

Case in point: My dad at age 94, seeking to revisit the rough and tumble world of male fellowship, tried to start a Men’s Club at this retirement home.

It was not well attended. At the initial meeting, three other gentlemen showed up. All were in wheelchairs. Two of them slept through the proceedings. Meeting adjourned.

According to a survey by the Pew Research Center, most Americans don’t want to stick around much longer than current life expectancy (approximately 77 for men, 82 for women). Sixty percent don’t want to live past 90. Thirty percent don’t want to live past 80.

People who make lots of money don’t want longer lives any more than the rest of us do. Nor do people who think there’s no afterlife.

And yet....

There are some 55,000 centenarians in the U.S. these days, and the number could increase as the population ages and health care evolves. A century ago, the number was near zero.

Bottom line: They may drag you kicking and screaming to 100 whether you want to go or not.

What’s it like to be 100? According to a study by United Healthcare, 36 per cent of those who reach that age feel “blessed” and 31 per cent say they are happy. Most of my friends and I would fall into a new category: “shocked.”

When asked which stage of life they remembered most fondly, nearly 25 per cent chose their 20s. Almost none embraced their 70s, 80s and 90s. Of course, being centenarians, a majority said they don’t remember.

Many in the study said they would like to have dinner with President Obama although he was facing stiff competition from Betty White. Least likely to be invited to dine were Kim Kardashian and Kayne West but most admitted they had no idea who they were. I doubt familiarity would have changed the result.

The secret to a long life?

More than 90 percent answered “staying close to friends and family” followed by maintaining a sense of independence, eating right and having a sense of humor.

Well and good. But there is a new factor in the longevity game, one recently disclosed by scientists that re-interprets the old saying that “youth is wasted on the young.”

A trio of new studies has discovered that the blood of young mice appears to reverse some of the effects of aging when put into the circulatory systems of elderly mice, according to a story in the Washington Post.

After combining the blood circulations of two mice by conjoining them — one old, the other young — researchers found dramatic improvements in the older mouse’s muscle and brain.

They later discovered that injections of a special protein found abundantly in young blood — or even transfusions of whole young blood — give the same advantages as sharing a blood supply.

Old mice who were injected with the protein or who received a blood transfusion navigated mazes faster and ran longer on treadmills. They easily outperformed their control peers, who were given only saline.

I presume the young mice in the experiment became instantly grumpy, yelling "get off of my lawn."

While this may be news to scientists, many of us suspect this is exactly the sort of thing that has kept Mick Jagger and Keith Richards alive for years. Then there’s the whole Dracula legend although I’m not sure the Count was finicky about the age of his subjects since he is reportedly several centuries old.

Aside from the amusing if not bizarre notion of seniors becoming an army of bloodsuckers, there is a serious side to all of this.

Neuroscientist Tony Wyss-Coray of Stanford University said he hopes to dive into human studies immediately. His new startup, Alkahest, is planning the first young-blood clinical trial at Stanford this year, according to the Post story.

Patients with Alzheimer’s disease will be given young blood, with researchers measuring their cognitive condition before and after.

“Right now we can’t do anything for Alzheimer’s patients, and this seems so easy and simple,” Wyss-Coray said.

The young mice in the three studies were the human equivalent of people in their 20s, so this would probably be the age range for donors used in a clinical trial. He said treating the big-picture issue of aging could in turn ease the burden of many diseases.

There is one of word of caution from researchers:   No matter how tempted, don't try a transfusion at home.

Wing Nuts

A quick quiz: When it comes to customer satisfaction, what institution do American consumers loath most? (A) Airlines. (B) the Internal Revenue Service. (C) Cable television providers. (D) Social networking sites.

If you guessed all four, you are correct. You win a no-expense-paid trip in economy class for an audit of your last 10 tax returns while sitting between a Twitter fanatic and a Times Warner cable telemarketer.

It comes as no surprise that airlines finished near the top of this dubious achievement list, compiled by the American Customer Satisfaction Index travel report.

The last United Airlines flight I took was aboard a plane so old there was a copy of the Saturday Evening Post in the seat pocket.

Dinner was the legendary snack box containing cheese spread which contained no discernible cheese, crackers and a piece of fruit for 10 bucks.

To ease the pain, I washed it down with a half-bottle of Chateau Screw Top cabernet ($8) which had been bottled the week before.

According to the survey, passengers appreciate that airlines are mishandling fewer bags, although that’s slicing the baloney a bit thick. Nearly 1.8 million pieces of luggage were lost, stolen, or damaged by major U.S. airlines in 2012 — just on domestic flights.

Believe it or not, that’s a significant decline over previous years, but it’s not because the industry has all of a sudden decided to become vigilant.

No, it’s because high luggage fees have resulted in more and more passengers using carry-on bags. Which will work until the airlines find a way to install coin-operated overhead bins.

The flight itself is making some passengers unhappy, with seat comfort and in-flight service particularly dissatisfying. Seat comfort scored 63 out of a possible 100 points, while in-flight service rated an index score of 67 points, according to the survey. Hardly breaking news.

According to the Wall Street Journal, “New Boeing 737-800s now being delivered to American Airlines have the same-size cabins as the existing 737-800s in American’s fleet. But the new planes have 12 more coach seats, pushing the total number of seats to 160. Delta Air Lines has also added 10 seats to its 737-800s, raising the total to the same 160. So has Continental Airlines.”

You can do the math.

So which airline do fliers like least? The answer is less than eyebrow-raising: the aforementioned United Airlines.

Its 2010 merger with Continental Airlines is likely one of the reasons, ACSI explained. “We’ve seen time and time again the negative impact mergers have on customer satisfaction,” Claes Fornell, ACSI founder, said in a statement, adding that American Airlines could also see slumping satisfaction as it combines operations with US Airways.

But that didn’t happen in United’s combination with Continental. While it ranked dead last, United rose two points, probably because Continental’s traditionally high customer satisfaction buoyed United’s traditionally lower score, the study said.

For the record, JetBlue and Southwest are the airlines most in favor.

Back on the ground, what does the ACSI survey say consumers like best in the way of goods and services?

At the top of the list is television and video players, credit unions, soft drinks, personal care and cleaning products, automobiles and light vehicles, full-service restaurants, breweries and athletic shoes.

Bringing up the rear are wireless telephone services, health insurance, Internet news and information, gasoline stations and hotels.

An eclectic list if I ever saw one.

If you take this survey at face value, you could presumably launch a successful political campaign by promising even larger flat-screen TVs, tastier soft drinks, gentler deodorant and stronger tile cleaner, sleeker automobiles, more restaurants where people serve you, a brewery on every corner and sneakers that will allow each and every one of us to run like the wind and play above the rim.

These seem to be the things Americans care about.

But lest we demean the nation’s consumers, another ACSI survey disclosed that the company Americans hate most is McDonald’s.

With some justification. A recent study conducted by the National Employment Law Project found that McDonald’s employees rely more on public assistance programs than any other large fast-food company, with an estimated $1.2 billion in costs to the public.

Making matters worse, McDonald’s advised some of its employees to sell their possessions to make up for holiday spending debt. Recently, the fast food chain’s hotline designated to help its workers live on their modest incomes encouraged employees to apply for food stamps.

But no such Dumpster diving for the chief executive of McDonald’s. He earns more than $9,200 an hour, which is at least 1,000 times the hourly wages of their sales associates, according to published reports.

Against that backdrop, the fast-food giant reported that sales in the United States continue to decline. Its first-quarter earnings fell well short of analysts’ expectations.

Maybe, just maybe, we Americans get it right.