252 Years Old?

The reputable Dean Wu Chung-chieh of the department of Education at Minkuo University, China, last week announced that he had found recorded in Imperial Chinese chronicles dated 1777 the fact that one Li Ching-yung had been imperially honored for being 100 years old, that 1877 annals reported the same Li Ching-yung celebrating his sooth anniversary, that the same ancient is now 252 years old and is still living in Kai-shen, Szechwan Province.

About 5,000 people in the U. S. claim to be 100 or older. Most of them unintentionally exaggerate, said Louis Dublin, Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. statistician who hastened from the National Safety Council meeting at Chicago last week to the American Public Health Association Convention at Minneapolis. To the health officers he named 80 as the maximum age to which most people could aspire. Medical, public health and sanitary work the past half century has increased the average life of the whole population by 20 years, but has not been able to prevent senility and the deterioration of old age, has not lengthened human life appreciably.