Waiter. Trapeze Performer. Houdini's Assistant. San Francisco's Nonagenarian Runner.
Evan Harris
Advising clients navigating public relations, issues, public affairs. Former Edelman, CA Legislature comms director, BPD/health care. 14+ years experience in media relations, strategic comms, exec visibility, M/A comms.
Larry Lewis is something born out of myth, legend and obscurity. Lewis may be best known from television interviews in the late 1960s. In one interview from 1966, Lewis is doing what he does every morning.
Running six or 6.7 miles around Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. Impressive but not necessarily a feat of endurance. Except for the fact that Lewis is 99 years old. And he's half shadowboxing, half-dancing like Conor McGregor as he runs.
Lewis looks like he stepped out of an L.L. Bean catalog in the interview; running and boxing in khakis, a sweater and a S.F. Giants hat. For 99, Lewis moves better than someone half his age. Maybe better than someone at 39.
Watching and listening to Lewis brings up one question: who the hell is this guy? A 99-year-old who runs more than six miles a day? The search for who Lewis is and how he ended up gracing the paths of Golden Gate Park in the 1960s every morning has a few surprises.
"In San Francisco he worked as a waiter at the St. Francis Hotel and celebrated his 102nd birthdayby running 100 yards in 17.3 seconds, half a second faster than on his 101st birthday. The extra speed, Lewis explained, was due to his sneakers. He said he wore street shoes for the 101st birthday run."
Let's start with what Lewis did in 1966 - the year we see him doing his best Muhammad Ali impression. Lewis was a waiter at the St. Francis Hotel. With Lewis being 99 at the time, that would make him one of the oldest employed people
Another connection to Lewis claims is an archived New York Times article from June 26, 1971. The brief article says Lewis took his 104th birthday off from work at the St. Francis Hotel but still ran his 6.7 mile loop in Golden Gate Park. The article also notes he celebrated his 19th wedding anniversary to his wife Bessie. If you're doing the math, that means he got married at 85.
Word about Lewis must have got around back then. He appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, the Merv Griffin Show and Pat Boone in Hollywood. In a generation before viral videos and influencers, Lewis seems to have been one.
Above are photos of Lewis waiting at the St. Francis and in his boxing stance. The caption reads "...the youthful 95 years old waiter..."
One of Lewis longstanding claims is to a famous magician
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Amazingly, Lewis outlived his wife Bessie. She passed away in 1972 in her 70s. An article that same year in the Northern California Running Review wrote that Lewis worked 3 shifts a day at the St. Francis Hotel after Bessie died; up to 17 hours. Safe to say he probably kept his six mile runs going, too.
From all accounts, Lewis never really stopped running or working until his death in 1974. Lewis died on February 1, 1974, at 106-years-old; his life spanning from two years after the Civil War ended to the mid-1970s.
Many of Lewis' accounts could never be verified. Was he really Houdini's assistant? Was he really in the circus and born in the 1860s? It's hard to know specifics. What's clear is that Larry Lewis was a force. He challenged stereotypes around old age
Some really basic math put Lewis running ability into perspective. If we assume he truly ran six miles every day from 99 years old until his death at 106; Lewis logged 10,950 miles.
Even if we remove days or weeks due to illness or taking a day off, Lewis is still running thousands of miles at ages most people don't live to or spend their time largely immobile.
Despite knowing who is and how he lived, he's still a bit of myth. One part unstoppable runner, one part every day man, one part colorful and eventful past
"His advice was simple but profound: 'When you make a friend, hold them close.' He was grateful he had."
-EH
Extra Reading: https://gerontology.fandom.com/wiki/Larry_Lewis