“We slept on the ground,” Charlie told me. “We were so exhausted. Sometimes we got a bath in a horse tank.” Though I heard Charlie tell this story a number of times, I never dulled to his marvelous self-confidence. Not only had he set out at age sixteen to cross the country on unpaved roads. Not only had he done it without letting anyone know where he was going or when he would return. He did it with empty pockets sure that he could make his way somehow.”
That’s a passage from David Von Drehle’s biography The Book of Charlie: Wisdom from the Remarkable American Life of a 109-year-old Man. In 2007, the author and his family moved across the street from Charlie White, a then 102-year-old physician and anesthesiologist.
Over seven years Von Drehle spends time hearing about Charlie’s very full and adventurous life. The passage I read refers to a cross country trip Charlie made with two friends in a Model-T back when there were no major highways. They traveled back hopping railroad cars. He taught himself how to play the saxophone and used his talent to earn money for school.
Charlie became a doctor before the discovery of penicillin and when doctors made house calls. One of his medical stints included shifts on ambulances that found him caring for gangsters. He was one of the nation’s first anesthesiologists.
One of the cases he worked on was hand surgery for the president of Peru who then gave Charlie a cruise through the Amazon. When asked to what he attributed his long life, Charlie would say luck and “It’s simple. Do the right thing.” Charlie only lived his last year in a nursing home.
If you’re looking for a fascinating story of a man who lived a long life to the fullest, then you must read The Book of Charlie by David Von Drehle.
