Rosemarie Alexander, KTOO ­ Juneau Memorial services for the Reverend Doctor Walter Soboleff will be carried live on statewide television Saturday. Beginning at 2 p.m., Doctor Soboleff will be remembered at a Grand Camp Alaska Native Brotherhood and Alaska Native Sisterhood service followed by a community memorial. The public affairs channel 360 North will televise the entire event.  Sealaska Corporation and Sealaska Heritage Foundation are sponsoring the special broadcast. 360 North can be seen on GCI cable channel 15 throughout Alaska, and over-the air on KTOO, KAKM and KUAC public television in Juneau, Anchorage and Fairbanks.  360 North is also available on Dish Network and DirecTV, and is streamed on the Internet at www.360north.org. The Doctor Walter Soboleff Memorial Page is available on Facebook for people wishing to post remembrances.   A memorial account has been set up at Wells Fargo bank. The beloved Tlingit elder and Presbyterian minister passed away on Sunday at the age of 102. Download Audio (MP3)

Enclosure: http://media.aprn.org/2011/ann-20110527-04.MP3

Site Search Tags: Betty+White, humor, ageism, TV

Bethel the Kodiak brown bear, celebrating birthday in Australia

Not grizzly at all… Bethel the kodiak bear lounges in her enclosure at Sydney’s Taronga Zoo. (ABC news)

Australia’s oldest bear has celebrated its 32nd birthday.

Bethel the kodiak [sic] bear also has the distinction of being one of the oldest of its species in the world.

It’s become a birthday ritual that never fails to delight the grand old dame of Taronga Zoo.

“She was bashing at the door as soon as she could smell that salmon coming in,” said zookeeper Deb Olsen.

“She knows that it’s a special day when she sees the big salmon there.”

I noticed while reading up on Bethel’s birthday bash that the Australian Broadcasting Company (ABC) has a tag or category for news feeds called aged-care. Click on the ink below to add it to your news reader.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local January 11, 2009 Oldest on Earth
1. Gertrude Baines, 114, Los Angeles; born April 6, 1894
2. Beatrice Farve, 113, Georgia; April 30, 1895
3. Kama Chinen, 113, Japan; May 10, 1895
4. Mary Josephine Ray, 113, New Hampshire; May 17, 1895
5. Olivia Patricia Thomas, 113, New York; June 29, 1895
6. Neva Morris, 113, Iowa; Aug. 3, 1895
7. Chiyo Shiraishi, 113, Japan; Aug. 6, 1895
8. Tomoji Tanabe, 113, Japan; Sept. 18, 1895 9. Maggie Renfro, 113, Louisiana; Nov. 14, 1895 10. Yoshino Ide, 113, Japan; Jan. 1, 1896
Source: Inglewood-based Gerontology Research Group

Site Search Tags: centenarians, age+grade, demography

• Nonagenarian American Indian linguist

  http://theelderlies.wordpress.com/2006/09/18/american-indian-linguist/

Esther Martinez: ‘A way to honor her spirit’ Historical roadside marker celebrates Tewa linguist and renowned storyteller
11/8/2008 – 11/9/08
OHKAY OWINGEH — New Mexico honored Ohkay Owingeh storyteller and Tewa linguist Esther Martinez Blue Water (P’oe Tsáwä) on Saturday by unveiling a new roadside marker at the pueblo north of Española.

…

“It is an honor to have a marker that recognizes her contributions to her pueblo and to others,” said Martinez, speaking to the large crowd gathered at the site along N.M. 68. “She was a person steadfast to the end.”

The wooden marker is the second of 55 that will be installed around the state in recognition of influential New Mexico women. .. The marker program was conceived by three women — Pat French, Beverly Duran and Alexis Girard. They created the New Mexico Historic Women Marker Initiative and lobbied the Legislature to fund the project.

“As we drove around the state, we realized all the historic markers up and down the road were all for men,” French said Saturday as she waited for the cutting of a silver ribbon around Martinez’s marker. “This is to create a better balance.”

…

Martinez, born in 1912, was known as an exceptional storyteller. Her family said she could use almost anything as the source of a good yarn, even everyday events. “My mother’s stories had such life and character,” daughter Josephine Binford said with a chuckle. “You could see what she described. When she spoke, it was like she cast a spell.”

… Martinez received many national honors for her work in preserving the language and stories of her people. She taught Tewa in the Ohkay Owingeh (formerly San Juan Pueblo) schools for years and created a Tewa dictionary. She traveled widely to share stories with non-Pueblo people. She received the Teacher of the Year award from the National Council of American Indians in 1997 and a year later was given the Governor’s Award for Excellence.

In 2006, Martinez was named a National Heritage Fellow by the National Endowment for the Arts.

Site Search Tags: Tewa, Martinez, Ohkay+Owingeh, nonagenarian, Espanola, New+Mexico, grandchildren, linguist, San+Juan+Pueblo

Yup’ik ties give Palins unique Alaska connection
NATIVE: Grandmother on Todd’s side calls the governor a ‘special gal.’ By TOM KIZZIA

Lena Andree, Todd Palin's grandmother, Sarah Palin's in-law

Published: October 19th, 2008 11:20 PM
Last Modified: October 19th, 2008 10:04 AM

HOMER — Like many Alaska Natives of her generation, Lena Andree, Todd Palin’s 87-year-old Yup’ik grandmother, grew up living between two worlds. [read more]
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/561419.html

For more on Todd Palin, Sarah Palin, and rural Alaska, Todd Palin, Sarah Palin’s husband, and rural Alaska living

Site Search Tags: Sarah+Palin, Yup’ik, Alaska, octogenarian

If you know of someone else that can give a feel or better yet, actual numbers or examples, please ask them. Post your results in comments below or e-mail me.

* Sarah Palin, the elderly, the disabled, older Americans and rural Alaska

Site Search Tags: Palin, refugee, migration, community+disruption, can+you+help

from WHAT’S UP – October 15, 2008
Compiled Weekly by Peg Tileston On behalf of the Alaska Women’s Environmental Network (AWEN), Alaska Center for the Environment (ACE), and Alaska Conservation Alliance (ACA)

*November 21
Deadline for proposal submission for THE EPA BUILD HEALTHY COMMUNITIES FOR ACTIVE AGING GRANTS. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency plans to award in early 2009, two grants for $100,000 each to train older adults to be environmental leaders and demonstrate how greenways and sustainable streets can improve the environment, human health and the quality of life for persons of all ages. Building Healthy Communities for Active Aging Training and Demonstration Projects must include a strategy that either 1) trains older adults to be environmental leaders on local planning decisions that affect their community’s built environment; or 2) demonstrates how greenways and sustainable streets can improve the quality of life for persons of all ages while improving environmental quality. For purposes of this RFP Greenways and Sustainable Streets are defined as follows: Greenways are linear corridors of open space. They include natural corridors (e.g., along a stream, river, or ridge), canals, rail road rights of way converted to recreational use, and trails. They link places together, inviting city and community residents to experience a connection with the natural environment. Greenways connect neighborhoods, downtowns, schools, community centers, and other important public places. They can include waterfront walkways, stream corridors and other natural ecological reserves, as well as off-street biking and walking paths. Sustainable Streets are a multimodal rights-of-way designed and operated to create benefits to mobility, community and ecology. They are streets that use sustainable design principles that promote safe, least-polluting ways to connect people and incorporate natural, landscape-based methods that infiltrate, reuse, or evaportranspirate (allow water to evaporate back into the air) stormwater runoff, and mitigate the “urban heat island effect” (the additional heating in the air over a city as the result of replacement of vegetated surfaces with those composed of heat-retaining, man-made materials such as asphalt and dark colored roofing). Eligible entities include States, or state agencies, the District of Columbia, territories, American Indian Tribes (federally recognized), and possessions of the U.S. It is also available to public and private universities and colleges, hospitals, laboratories, other public or private nonprofit institutions, and 501(c)(3) organizations. For more information, go to http://www.epa.gov/aging/grants/index.htm#2008_1121_grant_1.

Site Search Tags: EPA, grants, funding, sustainable, training, environment

10-15-08
by Jodi Friend, student Kuskokwim Campus

My paternal grandfather Otto Friend has lived in the native village of Kwigillingok, a costal village located on the Southwestern Region of Alaska, nearly all his life.

When my grandfather was a young boy, most of the Yup’ik people in the village lived on the left side of the Kwigillingok River, while only a few lived on the right side.

…what are my grandfather’s personality, favorite foods, and hobbies?
My grandfather is mean, grumpy, strict, selfish, and forgetful at times, but he is also humorous, caring, and loving. His nickname is “Apiin” (similar to grandfather) and “Dad.”

Otto loves to eat blackberry “akutaq” (Eskimo ice cream), beluga whale blubber, dried salmon, white fish, bird soup, and loves drinking Red Rose tea with his elder friends.

His hobbies include watching Kung Fu movies, taking naps, snow machine riding, checking the Kwigillingok River, playing with his grandchildren, working on seal skin, carving wood, and taking steam baths.

… After serving in the Alaskan Territorial Guard (ATG), his sight has not been the same. My paternal aunts and uncles told me that Otto, little by little, stopped going subsistence hunting because of his affected vision. Although he has this problem, it does not keep him from being in charge of how the gathered and hunted food is prepared or stored for the winter.

Right now, he’s 90-years-old and he still walks and takes a steam bath in the “maqivik” (steam house or sauna) just about every night…. In conclusion, Otto is a lot of fun to be around. I admire and respect him because he has been through so much in his life and because he has a lot of experience when it comes to subsistence living. He is also a very good grandfather, not just to me, but to my other relatives as well. [...]

• http://deltadiscovery.com/speakyourmind/speakyourmind.html

Site Search Tags: nonagenarian, Yup’ik, grandfather, grandchildren

“Several of my friends and I hit the streets to interview people about the election. We were lucky enough to have these two young women happen along. Being from Alaska, they had a great inside view on Sarah Palin’s governing. “

http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-113360#

aucella // 21 hours ago
Let me clear some things up. The video was shot the day of the 1st debate in LA, hence the tank tops. Though born and raised in AK, I now live in LA where my friend was visiting me. On our tour of tinsel town we stumbled across a student film crew and gave them our opinion on what I like to refer to as “The Palin Problem”. It wasn’t meant to be objective, thats kind of the point of an opinion. And how can Alaskans be outraged that we don’t think highly of our own politicians? Stevens is being indicted, Young is under investigation, Palin is guilty of abuse of power, and there are countless others at the state congressional level who’ve been tried for corruption in the last 4 years. I’m not proud of that representation, but I’m being honest.

Site Search Tags: Sarah+Palin

Gladys had been active on the Senior Advisory Board to the Eddie Hoffman Senior Center in Bethel. Her Archive for the ‘nonagenarian’ Category biography and poster is posted earlier here–

• Gladys Jung nonagenarian

revised 2008-10-26
2008 Alaska Federation of Natives Elder of the Year, Gladys Hall Jung, Bethel http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/568008.html

[revised 2008-11-10] The Tundra Drums has two good stories about Ms Jung–
Gladys Jung named Elder of the Year, By Alex DeMarban, October 30, 2008 http://thetundradrums.com/news/show/3679

Sunny side of Jung http://thetundradrums.com/news/show/3802

Here at Slate, we take the subject of growing old more seriously. Heck, it’s going to happen to all of us someday—if we’re lucky. And so we have commissioned a series of articles on aging and the aged. We wanted to see the world through the eyes of our elders, to explore the ways in which old folks influence our economy, politics, and culture. To walk a mile in their Rockports.

Wednesday

“Pimp My Buick: Will new technologies make old people safer on the road?” by Farhad Manjoo. Posted Sept. 10, 2008.

“What’s the Best Adult Diaper? That depends,” by Justin Peters. Posted Sept. 10, 2008.

“The Senior-Citizen Cookbook: How your food needs will change as you get older,” by Sarah Dickerman. Posted Sept. 10, 2008

“Diary of a 100-Year-Old Man: Dreams of My Mother, and a Visit From My Grandson,” by Leon Despres. Posted Sept. 10, 2008

Recycled: “Naughty Nursing Homes: Is it time to let the elderly have more sex?” by Daniel Engber. Posted Sept. 10, 2008

Tuesday

“Is Grandpa Bad for the Environment? Climate change and the aging population,” by Jacob Leibenluft. Posted Sept. 9, 2008.

Best Friends Forever: Grumpy Old Men, The Bucket List, and the undying appeal of the old-buddy movie,” by Jessica Winter. Posted Sept. 9, 2008.

“A Visit to My Future: What happens when I try to live like a senior citizen,” by Emily Yoffe. Posted Sept. 9, 2008.

“The Oldest Profession: Why don’t architects ever retire?” by Witold Rybczynski. Posted Sept. 9, 2008.

Alaska and Tucson forever associated… Perhaps she can give you a free ride:
http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/hourlyupdate/256059.php
This article asks whether she will put on eBay her new plane.

OOPS, she ordered Al Gore to stop flying his plane. Presumably it was a reference to climate change. The only one during her speech. Now she got a plane with a big carbon footprint. She can transport some moose or hundred reporters.

Her Al Gore joke contrasted with a week full of estimates of the magnitude of the expected magnitude of the sea level rise, news about the Canadian ice shelf loss and of polar bears in peril. Neither the media nor the pundits tearing apart her speech thought of asking whether she has any plan (or plane) to relocate the affected Native populations.

No one thinks about relocation nor have they much. There are several hundred towns which must be relocated some or great distances, including houses, schools, electrical plants, sewage, garbage, telephones, churches, graveyards, water treatment, etc etc.

By the way, the Republican Murkowski jet, which was unable to visit most places in Alaska (no runways large enough), did NOT sell on e-Bay. It finally had to be given away, relatively speaking.

Site Search Tags: Palin, jet, eBay, climate+change, Alaska+Native, erosion, Republican

naomidagenbloom 2008 September 2

Vuee, Vuee, We need to hear MORE from you now about the way Alaska has come into our consciousness via your governor–the believer in “stakeholders.”

Readers can’t get off that easy, Little Red Hen– what questions do folks have?

The reason I have been rather quiet, blogwise, is because the news from rural Alaska about living there isn’t good. There has been next to nothing improved since earlier posts, this includes the past 18 months of the personable Gov. Sarah Palin. I’ll give examples below, but they sound depressing. So readers, what do enquiring minds want to know? If nothing else, I can at least point you to some good sources of facts or commentary from Alaska perspective.

An older friend of mine (from Tucson) sends this musing upon the early photo of Sarah Palin and her caribou ( http://newsminer.com/photos/galleries/2008/sep/01/sarah-palin-growing-alaskan/1156/. It is the photo of the red-nosed caribou NOT a reindeer.)

>My deep reflections, caribou inspired::
1. Macho women don’t need to wear pantsuits to assert themselves.
2. Most currently popular female names go from my daughter Michelle to my mother Sarah.
3. Sarah definitely shoots better than Dick. How about Joe’s expertise with firearms?
4. Candidates should not be judged only on basis of age, gender, and looks.
5. Candidate’s children are given on-stage prominence. It should be unfair to have the youngest ones debate politics, but what about having a food fight?

————————————-

• there’s the older gentleman who is resigning himself to move 400 miles away from home to be near his grandkids because his grown children had to move to Anchorage to find work to meet the utilities payments
• there’s all the older people who need an assisted living arrangement or nursing home (a 400 mile trip, if one can afford to get into Bethel from the village to get on the jet)
• there’s fuel oil at $6-15 a gallon
• there’s the Bush-Cheney stimulus payments which only went to those who have taxable income. They don’t go to those who cashed in IRAs early to pay electricity or who struggle to make sense of their returns.
• there’s electricity at 40 cents or more per kilowatt hour (with a subsidy for residences) in rural Alaska (Wasilla pays considerably less, without subsidy)
• there’s gasoline, needed to go out and “grocery shop” on the tundra or out in the river, at $6 to $18 gallon.
• there’s gaining grandmother status at 34
• there’s raising grandchildren at 70
• there’s having your one-time $1200 “energy check” from the state stolen by your children for smokes and booze

2008-09-04 Look guys, what someone else found
gov-sarah-palin-call-in-kyuk/

2008-09-04 Fact Check of Governor Palin’s Speech http://progressivealaska.blogspot.com/2008/09/saradise-lost-chapter-twenty-five-obama.html

PALIN: “Senator McCain also promises to use the power of veto in defense of the public interest – and as a chief executive, I can assure you it works.”
REALITY: PALIN OPPOSED CRUCIAL EDUCATION, HEALTH CARE AND SENIORS FUNDING [...]

Andrew Halcro does a fine job at http://www.andrewhalcro.com/grading_palins_speech_a

Also: tech support has a listing of reasonable sources at Sarah Palin content

2008-10-27 Palin’s gaffe about her policy on “special needs” while her record shows she has none
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BlueOasis/~3/431498178/showDiary.do

Site Search Tags: Sarah+Palin, caribou, elderly, Alaska, aging, Little+Red+Hen, diasability, long-term+care

[deadline]

Long Term Care Community Forum for Stakeholders of State Long Term Health Care Services and Supports [sic]

The Alaska Department of Health and Social Services (DHSS) has hired HCBS Strategies Inc. to develop recommendations for improving the long term care services it provides to older adults and individuals with disabilities of all ages. As part of developing these recommendations we have obtained feedback from stakeholders such as consumers and their families, providers and direct care workers. We are holding Community Forums to gain reactions from stakeholders on our draft set of recommendations before they are finalized. All those interested may attend.

Individuals are welcome to participate in person or through a web-enabled conference call. Individuals must pre-register for webinars in advance! For those that have limited computer or internet access they may participate by phone only by using the conference call numbers listed below.

Dates/Locations:
Tuesday, August 26th from1:00 – 4:00pm: Downtown Anchorage Marriott- Anchorage/ Via Phone: (702) 824-9512 Access code: 224-977-617 Audio Pin: #

Wednesday, August 27th 5:00 – 8:00 pm: Centennial Hall Convention Center- Juneau /Via Phone: (702) 824-9512 Access code: 126-987-378 Audio Pin: #

Friday, August 29th 1:00 – 4:00pm: Westmark Fairbanks Hotel- Fairbanks Via Phone: (702) 824-9512 Access code: 177-724-278 Audio Pin: #

To for more information or to register for the Forum webinars please go to www.AKLTC.com
If you have questions please contact Kristy Michael with HCBS Strategies by e-mail Kristy AT hcbs DOT info or by phone: 410-858-0807

Site Search Tags: deadline, longterm+care, assisted+living, Alaska, DHSS, comment, public+involvement

The company homepage is almost no help.

“CDPC performs fiscal intermediary functions for the Consumer, including processing time sheets, billing Medicaid, and caregiver payroll. CDPC provides training for the Consumer and resources for caregiver training and also assists the Consumer in maintaining program compliance.”

The Arizona program description is a bit more helpful–

“What is Consumer-Directed Personal Care?
Consumer-Directed Care is available to individuals who need attendant care services in their home. Self-Directed care puts you in control, allowing you to arrange and direct your own services. You select, train and manage your caregiver who may be a trusted friend, neighbor or relative. Individuals must be capable of directing their own services or arranging for a representative to act on their behalf.”

Contact info for the Alaska program is http://www.consumerdirectonline.net/alaska/ Anyone have any experience with this group?

Invited by the state in 2001 to help develop the Consumer Directed Personal Care Services Program, we are proud to be part of communities across the state of Alaska by supporting and promoting self-directed personal care services. The program is specifically intended to allow individuals with health care needs to remain in their homes and communities avoiding placement in an institution. This program is designed for individuals who are capable of directing their own personal care services or appointing a Personal Representative to act on their behalf.

Alaska program requirements include:
* Eligibility for Alaska Medicaid
* The need for assistance with activities of daily
living such as:
– medication reminders - transfers
– bathing & hygiene - dressing & grooming
– ambulation - eating
– toileting, bowel & bladder care
* Authorization by a health care professional that assistance is necessary
* Completion of an assessment for placement in the program
* There is no age requirement in the state of Alaska

Contact a program coordinator at:
Anchorage
The Emerald Building
615 East 82nd Ave, Suite 101
Anchorage, AK 99518
Phone: (907) 222-2652
Toll free: 1- 888 – 966-8777
Fax: (907) 677-8777
infoAK AT ConsumerDirectOnline DOT net

Wasilla
Kenai
Kodiak

Site Search Tags: in-home, in-situ, aging+in+place, home+care, PCA, family, caregiver

The International Association of Homes and Services for the Ageing, http://www.iahsa.net IAHSA is an NGO in Special Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations.
2519 Connecticut Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20008-1520
iahsa/AT/aahsa/DOT/org
Phone (202) 508-9468
Fax (202) 220-0041

IAHSA is an affiliate of AAHSA American Association of Homes and Services for the Ageing

Site Search Tags: elderblogs, aging, ageing, resources, international, housing, eldercare

When the Wind Was a River: Aleut Evacuation in World War II or http://tinyurl.com/l49ay

Book review of Dean Kohlhoff’s When the Wind Was a River: Aleut Evacuation in World War II. Lydia T. Black, Ph.D. / Reprinted from: Pacific Historical Review v65, n4 (Nov 1996)

This book about the experience of a small group of indigenous Native American inhabitants of the Aleutian Archipelago during and after World War II. One of the villages was Atka — where the Chapel of St. Nicholas was damaged. [...]

Site Search Tags: WWII, Aleutians, Aleut, history, Alaska, Atka, Bataan, New+Mexico, Charlie+King, Lydia+Black

click to view original

In her class, Maile Loloa was almost 30 years older than her fellow students. But the grandmother of 11 didn’t let the age gap – or her lack of confidence in speaking publicly and writing in English – put her off.

She will graduate next month at age 67 from Manukau Institute of Technology with a bachelor of education, specialising in early childhood….

Mrs Loloa said the requirement for all teachers at most early childhood centres to have a degree or diploma by 2012 was one factor in her decision to go back to school. Manukau, where Mrs Loloa works, has low rates of participation in preschool and a shortage of trained teachers.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10506570&ref=rss

Site Search Tags: Tolstoy’s+bicyclists, pre-school, teaching, Polynesia, New+Zealand, Tonga, university, grandchild, grandparent

• Al-Can Highway and the Aleutians War, Alaska in WWII
• John Huston movie from the Aleutians
• More on the Aleutians war (WWII)
• http://www.flickr.com/photos/hlthenvt/sets/72157594189819428/

According to Charlie King (see photos), the dead were so numerous that the bulldozers used for the Al-Can were used to push the bodies into mass graves, disturbing to everyone.

revised The story from APRN.org focusses on the search for purposes of cremation and immediate re-burial in situ rather than identification of individuals. Search for Japanese remains on Attu resumes

U.S. and Japan search for WW II Japanese MIAs in Alaska. A team of three Japanese and 11 Americans departed Kodiak this morning aboard a C-130 bound for the U.S. Coast Guard Station on Attu. There, they’ll search burial sites for the bodies of soldiers still missing from a 1943 World War II battle there, according to the Department of Defense.

In June 1942, a unit of the Japanese Army occupied Attu, capturing and imprisoning many of its inhabitants. In May 1943, American forces began to recapture the island in fierce hand-to-hand battles. Casualties were estimated at 540 Americans and 2,300 Japanese.

The Japanese government assisted an American group’s 2007 visit to Iwo Jima in a similar search for missing American MIAs.

***”
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/newsreader/story/404583.html

click image to read more about Songkran – Elder Ceremony in Thailand. Here the elders are offered scented water to ritually wash themselves and bless the younger ones.

See related post on other days of celebrating older people, Grandparents’ Days or Respect for the Aged Day

Site Search Tags: elders, ceremony, youth, annual, holiday, Thailand, water, grandparents, Respect+for+the+Aged, Youth+and+Elders

2008-04-25 mentioned earlier, I see. So this becomes a reminder

http://theelderlies.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=486
Information below about the New Mexico Geriatric Summer Institute – a favorite course of many over the years, with no registration fees for Indian Health professionals.
Bruce Finke, MD
IHS / Nashville Area Elder Health Consultant
Chronic Care Initiative
(413) 584-0790

[deadline] June 19-21, 2008 Summer 2008 Geriatric Institute The New Mexico Geriatric Education Center (NMGEC) is pleased to announce the Summer 2008 Geriatric Institute to be held on June 19-21, 2008, at the Radisson Hotel and Conference Center, 2500 Carlisle Blvd. NE, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, with CME/CEUs offered. The title this year is Better Outcomes, Healthier Elders: Collaboration in Management of Chronic Disease. The last half day of the Institute will be on Health Literacy which can be applied toward a Certificate in Health Literacy of 25 credit hours. Additional sessions for the certificate will be announced soon.

Tuition waivers will be available to Tribal and Indian Health Service health care professionals to attend the Summer Geriatric Institute.

Please visit the NMGEC website at http://hsc.unm.edu/som/fcm/gec for more information on upcoming events. If you should require additional assistance, you can reach
Cly Clytemnestra Davison, Program Coordinator cdavison AT saludDOTunmDOTedu New Mexico Geriatric Education Center UNM Health Sciences Center, Dept. FCM MSC09 5040
1001 Medical Arts Ave NE, Room 244 Albuquerque, NM 87102-2708
505-272-4934 phone
505-272-4962 fax

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation Family and Informal Caregiver Support Program
The Weinberg Foundation will help community partnerships develop innovative ways to support these devoted caregivers. Available Funding: Up to $9 million over three years, the Family and Informal Caregiver Support Program will support from 12 to 20 community-based Projects with grants ranging from $100,000 to $300,000 per year. Deadline: Letters of Inquiry: Thursday, June 12, 2008 http://www.epa.gov/aging/grants/grant-list/2008_0612_grant_ofo_1.htm

Elder Care Initiative Long-Term Care Grant Program
The Indian Health Service announces the availability of grants to support planning and implementation of sustainable long-term care services for American Indians and Alaska Native elders. Deadline: June 20, 2008.
http://www.ihs.gov/NonMedicalPrograms/gogp/index.cfm?module=HHS-2008-IHS-LTC-0001

2nd Annual Rachel Carson Intergenerational Poetry, Essay and Photo Contest
The EPA Aging Initiative, in partnership with Generations United and the Rachel Carson Council, Inc., is inviting submissions for its Second Annual Rachel Carson Sense of Wonder Intergenerational Poetry, Essay and Photography Contest. The contest’s intergenerational approach reflects Carson’s desire to have adults and children share a sense of wonder about nature to discover nature’s gifts. Entries must be an intergenerational project. The deadline for entries is Monday, June 16, 2008. For more information see http://www.epa.gov/aging/resources/thesenseofwonder/index.htm

revised 2008-04-19
[from BHIC. See sidebar. Because so many older people are now raising their grandchildren, this program may be of interest.]

Mentoring Children of Prisoners: Caregiver’s Choice Program
Caregiver’s Choice makes it possible for many more kids across the country to have mentors, and for many more families to enjoy all the benefits of mentoring. This program is unique because it gives the child’s caregiver the power to choose—to look at the possibilities and decide on the best mentoring program to meet their needs and the needs of the child. Through Caregiver’s Choice, you can: – Access funding to serve more children; – Tap into federal funds; – Manage your participation level; – Leverage national efforts to recruit children of prisoners; and – Benefit from cutting-edge training and tools. For more information visit, http://www.mentoring.org/find_resources/caregiverschoice/

Site Search Tags: grants, funding, awards, fellowships, aging, children, environment, caregivers, respite, CBR, EPA, IHS, aging_initiativ, prison, grandchildren, revised

As a journalist, Dermot also has an interest in history (apart from his twin brother, Terrance, history professor at University of Alaska Fairbanks). Dermot Cole is the author of Amazing Pipeline Stories published by Epicenter Press in 1997, about the people and Fairbanks during the Alaska oil pipeline construction.

The perspective of Historic Photos of Alaska, is for those readers outside Alaska. That is, this is a pictorial history of Alaska as part of “America”. [Through no fault of this book, many in the US will still consider Alaska as a foreign body, along with New Mexico.]

The photos are arranged by time periods, from purchase to statehood– 1867-1905, 1906-1919, 1920-1940, and 1941-1979. These periods represent significant periods of US and Alaska relations. The orientation is a deliberate effort to stand apart from the usual Alaskana picture books. Another significant difference in this book is the choice of rarely seen photos and not the ubiquitous ones. The photos are reproduced with sufficient quality to review again and again and see something new each time.

Readers can follow themes such as regional changes (southeast Alaska also known as the Northwest Coast compared to Nome in northwest Alaska) and transportation. However, other themes can be chosen by readers according to personal interest.

Dogs
Most of the dogs are Alaska huskies (freight variety), such as ones on pages 44 and 55 and in harness, page 58. However, the team on page 67 is actually part of a Saami family (reindeer herders originally from Scandinavia. Note the hats and boot toes.) The harness setup is very different from that of the Eskimo family team on page 128. There are also sporting dogs (early 20th century conformation) such as the one on page 92 belonging to Jim Haly. Look carefully. The dog has just spotted another dog out of view, and kicked up a cloud of dust with his hind legs.

Electric trees
Even on the frozen tundra of Nome (page 111) and sprouting ever more branches over time in populated areas such as Cordova page 120 and Fairbanks page 151.

Military
One way to trace the influence of the military in Alaska is through men’s hats in the photos. Since Territorial days, the military has been a significant economic and development force in Alaska. Much of the early geological studies and geodetic surveys were military. World War II and then the Cold War continued the inflow of money and people. Photos from pages 168 to 180 show differing aspects of building the Al-Can or Alaska Highway and the later battles of Attu and the Aleutians. (see related posts here on the Al-Can and the Aleutians, http://theelderlies.wordpress.com/special-projects/photo-index-cking-wwii/)

Miscellany
Everywhere. The curiosity of Edwardian women’s fashion in open-air fish camp (useful against mosquitoes I suppose); the plank streets (for cars and horses) 400 miles from the nearest highway; even a Piggly-Wiggly store outside of the South.

Dermot Cole avoided the shop worn stash of Alaska photos. However, the next to last photo, page 197, is of the oil pipeline’s zigzagged engineering (to avoid temperature stresses) up the North Slope and over the Brooks Mountain Range. It’s a clever homage to the iconic Klondike gold rush photo of the future miners traipsing up the Chilkoot Pass.

I do have some quibbles with the book. There is an amazing variety of horses depicted but no photos of cows at Creamer’s Dairy in Fairbanks (I like the image of the wood stove chimney peeking out the milk truck to keep contents from freezing at 40 below).

More importantly, an outline map of Alaska is needed, with the places of photos identified.

The southwest of Alaska is mostly excluded. Considering that most folks in or outside Alaska believe everyone lives in an Eskimo igloo, it would also be helpful to include a map of languages/cultural regions in the state. Most readers will not be aware of the significance of the temporary, river going, hide boat depicted on page 44 built by the Athabascan Indian trapper to bring his skins to market. Compare with the more permanent skin boat built by Iñupiat Eskimo marine hunters on page 103. I already noted the Saami family.

The period of the first half of 1919 is missing although extremely important in the demography and history of non-urban Alaska. Upwards of 80% to 100% of people in some communities died during the pandemic of the “Spanish Flu”. The Jesse Lee Home (I ran across this recently published history) was one of several that cared for orphans left behind (those that survived long enough for help to reach them).

A suggested reading list would be nice, including Steven Langdon’s 1993. The Native People of Alaska. Anchorage, AK : Greatland Graphics. ISBN: 0936425172 9780936425177 OCLC: 27405205

A great companion volume would be John S. Whitehead’s 2004. Completing the Union: Alaska, Hawaii, and the Battle for Statehood. Albuquerque : University of New Mexico Press. ISBN: 0826336361 9780826336361 082633637X 9780826336378, OCLC: 55665367

This book is not supposed to be a comprehensive pictorial history. Cole did an amazing job just to make a selection from all the possibilities and put together such an enjoyable book.

Site Search Tags: history, Alaska, Fairbanks, Nome, Anchorage, gold+rush, territory, photos, Eskimo, Athabascan, trappers, Sitka, coffee-table, books, heritage, archives, 49th, statehood, USA, Valdez

Today she posted a list of items from the expert’s perspective (recipient) that we all too often forget or wished we knew when a friend or family is in care.

Amenities:
If you know anyone staying for a while in a hospital or extended care facility, among the things that will make life good for them, are: [...]

• Maya’s Granny http://mayagranny.blogspot.com/2008/04/errata.html

I would add a flannel shirt or some other easy to use coverup. Add your suggestions to Maya’s Granny or below.

Site Search Tags: long-term+care, assisted+living, nursing+home, mayagranny.blogspot, in+patient, comfy

Weinberg Foundation Announces Grant Program to Support Family Caregivers

Deadline: June 12, 2008

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation
( http://www.hjweinbergfoundation.org/ ) has announced an innovative new program to provide $9 million in grants to assist caregivers across the United States.

The Family and Informal Caregiver Funding Program was developed by the Weinberg Foundation to provide the critical resources necessary to support caregivers in innovative ways and facilitate partnerships among agencies and organizations. The primary goal of the program is to increase support for family and informal caregivers who assist older adults living in the community.

Eligible grant recipients include nonprofit 501(c)(3) organizations; faith- and other community-based organizations; tribal organizations; and units of local government nationwide.

The grant program will support from twelve to twenty community- based projects with grants ranging from $100,000 to $300,000 each (for a total of $300,000 to $900,000 for each grant recipient from March 2009 through February 2012).

Complete application details and additional information are available at the foundation’s Web site or by contacting the foundation’s offices.

Contact Information:
Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation
Tel: (410) 654-8500
Email: CaregivingRFP at theweinbergfoundation dot org

RFP Link:
http://fconline.foundationcenter.org/pnd/15012257/weinberg

For additional RFPs in Aging, visit:
http://foundationcenter.org/pnd/rfp/cat_aging.jhtml

Site Search Tags: grants, caregiver, foundationcenter.org, friends

Lori Shepler / Los Angeles Times, click to view original

By Tina Daunt, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer, April 4, 2008

AS F. Scott Fitzgerald once famously said, there are no second acts in American life. But Kirk Douglas, at age 91, has not only found a second act but now is writing a third in, of all places, cyberspace.
…

“Someone once told me, ‘Be ashamed to die before doing something for humanity,’ ” said Douglas, relaxing on one of the plush couches in his Beverly Hills home, with its gardens and courtyards, colorful paintings by Marc Chagall — a personal friend — and two beloved large dogs wandering in and out. “As you get older, you must think more of other people. You must strive to help other people. Who needs the most help but the young?

“What kind of world are we leaving them?”

It’s a question to which Douglas returns over and over on his website and in his new book, “Let’s Face It: 90 Years of Living, Loving, and Learning,” which was recently released as an audio book read by “Seinfeld’s” Jason Alexander.
[...]

MySpace page is
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=171170276

Site Search Tags: nonagenarian, elderblogger, MySpace, audiobook, Tolstoy’s+Bicyclist, accessibility

The Letter of Intent does not obligate you to apply, but we cannot accept applications unless there has been a letter of intent to apply. So if you think you might apply, send in a letter of intent!

June 20 application deadline
A pdf of the Federal Register Announcement can be found at: http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/2008/pdf/E8-6409.pdf

The application has not yet been posted but will be on www.Grants.gov using Funding Announcement Number: HHS–2008–IHS–EHC–0001 or CDFA number:93.933.

Bruce Finke, MD
IHS / Nashville Area Elder Health Consultant
Chronic Care Initiative
(413) 584-0790
(615) 417-4915 cell
http://www.ihs.gov/MedicalPrograms/ElderCare/index.asp

The AI/AN elder population is growing rapidly and the Al/AN population as a whole is aging. The prevalence of chronic disease in this population continues to increase, contributing to a frail elder population with increasing long-term care (LTC) needs.

LTC is best understood as an array of social and health care services that support an individual who has needs for assistance in activities of daily living over a prolonged period. LTC supports elders and their families with medical, personal, and social services delivered in a variety of settings to support quality of life, maximum function, and dignity.

While families continue to be the backbone of LTC for Al/AN elders, there is well documented need to support this care with formal services. The way these services and systems of care are developed and implemented can have a profound impact on the cultural and spiritual health of the community.

Home and community-based services have the potential for meeting the needs of the vast majority of elders requiring LTC services, supporting the key roles of the family in the care of the elder and the elder in the care of the family and community.

Katherine Fink of Green Bay. Click picture to read more

A retired regional supervisor for AAA, Katie never backed away from a challenge. Learning to downhill ski at age 58 and looking rather like a Mountie in her orange jacket, she quickly gave up the bunny slope for the ‘big ones’. After retiring, she took computer classes so she would be able to be of help in the office at Trinity Lutheran Church. A gifted seamstress and tailor she also became an accomplished and prize-winning porcelain doll maker after retiring.

http://victoriasjourneys.blogspot.com/2008/03/katherine-fink.html from Kasigluk

This program is designed to prepare basic tax returns for most low and middle income taxpayers, with an emphasis on senior citizens and disabled taxpayers. Sites are staffed by volunteers trained by the IRS to prepare basic tax returns. E-file means it’s fast, accurate AND it’s absolutely FREE. Volunteers receive training on the Earned Income Credit and other personal tax credits. If your income is below $39,783 you MAY qualify for an Earned Income Credit, up to $4,716.

*** You must file a 2007 tax return to receive the Economic Stimulus Payments. To be eligible for this payment, you must have a tax liability, or at least $3000 of earned income, Social Security benefits, or certain VA benefits. If you had at $3,000 of qualifying income, you should file a tax return even if you are not required.

AARP TaxAide sites may offer priority service to taxpayers age 60 and older.

As all locations are staffed by volunteers using donated space, these dates and times may change. To get the most current information, please call the Alaska 211 referral line by dialing 2-1-1, or 1-800- 478-2221. [try this and see if it works. There were problems last week or so-- the software couldn't figure out rural Alaska zip codes.]

NO COST ELECTRONIC FILING AVAILABLE

WHAT TO BRING
Social security cards or current record of SSN’s for you, spouse and all dependents.
Form W-2 (Wage and Tax Statement) from each employer.
All income information (such as Forms 1099-INT, 1099-DIV, SSA-1099 or RRB-1099 and 1099R).
Record of VA benefits received
Property tax and mortgage interest statements.
List of your medical, interest, contributions, and miscellaneous expenses (to itemize your deductions).
Copies of last year’s tax return (helps volunteer prepare this year’s return).
Child care payment information and name, address and SSN/EIN of your child care provider.

The rest of the document is written in a way to make it difficult to re-post so I’ll only list the names of places. Contact them for hours and dates.

• Anchorage Senior Center Tax-Aide
• Northeast Anchorage Tax-Aide
• First Free Methodist, Anchorage
• Spenard Rec Center
• Crosspoint Church Tax-Aide, Anchorage
• University of Alaska Anchorage
• Palmer Senior Center
• Mid-Valley Senior Center
• Wasilla Senior Center
• Upper Susitna Senior Housing
• Glacier View Bible Church
• Willow Senior Housing
• Fairbanks Senior Center Tax-Aide
• North Pole Library Tax-Aide
• University of Alaska Fairbanks
• Noel Wien Library Tax-Aide
• North Pole Senior Center Tax-Aide
• Nikiski Senior Citizens, Inc.
• Homer Senior Center
• Seward Senior Center
• AVTEC Library (Seward)
• Soldotna Tax-Aide Site
• University of Alaska, SE
• Swan Lake Senior Center
• United Methodist Church, Sitka
• Tongass Credit Union
• Rendesvous Senior Center
• Ketchikan Parks & Rec Center
• Metlakatla Tongass Credit Union
• Craig City Youth Center
• Juneau Mendenhall Library
• Wrangell Senior Center
• Kodiak College
• Valdez Tax-Aide
• Kodiak Senior Citizen Fair

Seven winning communities and government agencies from around the country are the recipients of the first-ever Building Healthy Communities for Active Aging awards. The award program recognizes outstanding community planning and strategies that support active aging and smart growth, thereby improving the quality of life of older adults.

By adopting smart growth principles, communities can design places that increase mobility and improve quality of life for older adults. Pedestrian-friendly, level walkways also increase access to these amenities and encourage older residents to walk to the doctor’s office or local stores. By providing a range of housing opportunities, communities can enable residents to move within their neighborhood as their housing needs change. Such life-long residents help to establish a strong sense of place within a community. The benefits of building healthy communities for active aging are being realized in communities across the country.

There are two award categories: the Commitment Award recognizes communities that have developed and begun to initiate a specific plan to implement smart growth principles and active aging concepts; the Achievement Award recognizes overall excellence in building healthy communities for active aging.

The 2007 Achievement Award winners are the Atlanta Regional Commission and the City of Kirkland, Washington. The 2007 Commitment Award winners included: City of Rogers Adult Wellness Center, Arkansas; Carver County Public Health, Carver County, Minnesota; Town of Scarborough, Maine; Queen Anne’s County Housing and Community Development, Maryland; Brazos Valley Council of Governments, Texas. For information about the winners see awards booklet at: http://www.epa.gov/aging/bhc/awards/2007/index.html

from February 2008 U.S. EPA Aging Initiative List Serve, http://www.epa.gov/aging/resources/

Powered by Zoundry

deadline June 19 – 21, 2008

The New Mexico Geriatric Education Center was re-funded this past year and will resume their highly popular Geriatric Summer Institute as well as an interdisciplinary geriatric certificate program. These programs are targeted to Indian Country. See below for details.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – The University of New Mexico Geriatric Education Center (NMGEC) is happy to announce a grant award from HRSA Bureau of Health Professions through 2010. NMGEC has been funded for the past 17 years by a HRSA grant in five-year cycles (latest cycle 2001-2006). Thanks to everyone for the letters and support during the period of Congressional budget cuts.

Under the grant goals, the NMGEC provides geriatric continuing education and training to health care professionals with an emphasis on providers in Tribal and Indian Health Service clinics. NMGEC education and training programs concentrate on fostering an appreciation of the richness of Indian culture and traditions, and an awareness of the use of traditional healing practices. In the past five years, the NMGEC has trained over 3,800 interdisciplinary health care professionals and paraprofessionals on elder care in culturally appropriate geriatric educational workshops, trainings and collaborations.

The NMGEC is please to announce the return of training and educational offerings. The Summer Geriatric Institute will be taking place in Albuquerque on June 19 – 21, 2008, with CME/CEUs offered. The title this year is Better Outcomes, Healthier Elders: Collaboration in Management of Chronic Disease. The last half day of the Institute will be on Health Literacy which can be applied toward a Certificate in Health Literacy of 25 credit hours. Additional sessions for the certificate will be announced soon.

Tuition waivers will be available to Tribal and Indian Health Service health care professionals to attend the Summer Geriatric Institute, please call NMGEC at 505-272-4934 for waiver request application. A reduced fee of $100 is available for CHRs wishing to attend.

The Interdisciplinary Geriatric Certificate Program (40 credit hours) will resume this year with four Saturday sessions. The first session will start March 29, 2008 with following sessions on July 12, September 27 and November 15. The Interdisciplinary Geriatric Certificate Program is for all health care professions with an interest in Geriatrics. The certificate requires 20 hours of core courses in geriatrics and 20 hours of elective courses/workshops to complete the program. Four sessions of core courses (20 hrs) will be offered in Spring and Fall 2008 and will repeat each year with CME and CEUs available.

• http://hsc.unm.edu/som/fcm/gec

Witness: One of the Great Correspondents of the 20th Century Tells Her Story by Ruth Gruber

With her perfect memory (and plenty of zip), 95-year-old Ruth Gruber – adventurer, international correspondent, photographer, maker of (and witness to) history, responsible for rescuing hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees during the Second War II and after – tells her story in her own words and photographs.

Gruber’s life has been extraordinary and extraordinarily heroic. She received a B.A. from New York University in three years, a master’s degree from the University of Wisconsin a year later, and a Ph.D. from the University of Cologne (magna cum laude) one year after that, becoming at age 20 the youngest Ph.D. in the world (it made headlines in The New York Times; the subject of her thesis: the then little-known Virginia Woolf).

At 24, Gruber became an international correspondent for the New York Herald Tribune and travelled across the Soviet Arctic, scooping the world and witnessing, firsthand, the building of cities in the Siberian gulag by the pioneers and prisoners Stalin didn’t execute … and when she was 33, Ickes assigned another secret mission to her – one that transformed her life: Gruber escorted 1,000 Holocaust survivors from Italy to America, the only Jews given refuge in this country during the war. [...]

• http://www.trurodaily.com/index.cfm?sid=106855&sc=73

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Somewhere Towards the End by Diana Athill 192pp, Granta Books, £12.99

http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,2239306,00.html
It’s a relief to find an amusing look at getting old, says Katharine Whitehorn
Saturday January 12, 2008, The Guardian

Diana Athill is 90 and has almost no regrets, despite having lived a life which most women of her class and era might have thought regrettable in the extreme.
…
And she still thinks so; that’s the joy of it. Although she sees with grim clarity the drawbacks and horrors of old age, illness, death, what comes across most is her acceptance and interested curiosity about the condition. She knows she has to be a carer for Barry, who has become diabetic and has other health problems and won’t control his diet. She dislikes being a carer very much and grumpily asks herself: “If a life so severely diminished is shortened by eating doughnuts what will it matter?” But she accepts it.

From The Times, January 11, 2008
Reflections on the gravity of growing older, Jane Shilling
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/jane_shilling/article3166519.ece
I’ve just been reading Somewhere Towards the End, Diana Athill’s memoir of old age

From The Times, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article3168331.ece

January 11, 2008
Sleepwalking into a crabbit old age– What are we doing introducing more health screening to allow us to live even longer? Valerie Grove

As Jane Shilling wrote, reviewing Somewhere Towards the End, by 90-year-old Diana Athill, Athill is cheered that women in her family “make old bones and good deaths”. But there is a chilly coda to this. Athill looked after her own dying mother.

…Athill has observed that good deaths tend to require the presence not merely of the principal actor, who is too busy dying to take charge of the manner of his or her demise, but also a producer and director, in the person of a daughter.

“But I have no daughter… And I haven’t got the money to pay for care of any kind. If I don’t have the luck to fall down dead while still able-bodied, it will be the geriatric ward for me.”

Even her redoubtable mind shrinks from this. “Fortunately, if a prospect is bleak enough, the mind jibs at dwelling on it,” she stoically adds.

We all jib at it: but for most the geriatric ward is the reality,

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2008/01/11/boath106.xml

Response to Elder Abuse Varies Widely Across U.S.
Dec 17, 2007 — Providence Journal, (RI), article tells how the nation’s safety net for seniors is not nearly as good as it is for children, and even though most states have mandatory reporting laws for elder abuse, fewer than half of them have statewide, 24-hour-a-day hot lines to record complaints and offer immediate response.

from RAC
This e-mail and the RAC Health listserv are a service of the Rural Assistance Center. The RAC is not responsible for the availability or content of these web sites. For additional services and information, see the RAC web site at http://www.raconline.org

Call early as I’m sure there will be a number of people trying to get in.

local numbers for Bethel 543-KYUK (543-5985) and state-wide 1-800-478-5985 (double-check this)

Questions to ask–

• why did elders not get their flu shots until the week before Thanksgiving? Older people are on the priority list. The state had vaccine available from mid-September.
• why was all that huge state block grant money spent on reducing the size of the workshop at the senior center, a partial rain shelter for the bus, siding, but no accessible toilets and no way for anyone with a walker or wheelchair to get from the parking lot to the door?
• why is the nearest nursing home or assisted living home 500 miles away? why must we continue to have elders die unattended (for hours sometimes) at these places?
• why is there only one intake screener for the elder abuse “hot” line?
• why don’t state grants for senior services require an active, effective, local senior advisory board at the recipent?
• why aren’t elders involved in emergency, pandemic, and disaster preparedness, including emergency shelters? (that’s because there is no emergency shelter in Bethel)
• what are the state’s plans for community relocation (environmental change) and how are elders involved?
• why are there no housing standards so elders don’t have to spend their limited income on extra heating fuel?
• why are there public water supplies with water so discolored and distasteful that elders spend their limted income on bottled water?

What’s your question to ask?

Site Search Tags: Sarah Palin, governor, KYUK, preparedness, flu, Katrina, deadline

World’s Oldest Milblogger Tells All, William Henry Bonser (“Harry”) Lamin
from Kris Alexander at Danger Room from Wired.com http://blog.wired.com/defense/

Military blogs have changed the way we follow and understand war. One British soldier’s “blog” is gaining a large readership on the internet as he details the daily routine of being a soldier…in WWI.
…
Bill Lamin, Harry’s grandson, has done an excellent job of researching the historical background and weaving an interesting narrative of both the battlefield and the homefront. Worth a look.

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/01/worlds-oldest-m.html

WW1: Experiences of an English Soldier This blog is made up of transcripts of Harry Lamin’s letters from the first World War. The letters will be posted exactly 90 years after they were written. To find out Harry’s fate, follow the blog! http://www.wwar1.blogspot.com/

Site Search Tags: WWI, nonagenarian, supercentenarian, milblog, military, grandchild, Wired.com

Source: Reuters TOKYO, Jan 4 (Reuters) – Faced with a prison population ageing as rapidly as the rest of the country, Japan is to build new jails with disabled access, including elevators, slopes for wheelchairs and grab-bars in toilets and baths.

The three new penal facilities will offer healthy meals and may also have specialists in nursing and rehabilitation on staff [...]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/T173848.htm

Site Search Tags: prison, Japan, accessible, barrier free

Photographer Mark Story took photos of people who were born in the 19th century and are still alive in the 21th Century…. The photographs for this portrait series were taken in various locations around the world between 1987 and 2005…. The idea to photograph people who have lived in three centuries evolved over the course of the project. First, I was simply interested in taking portraits of people who appear worn beyond their years by living extraordinarily hard lives. Those experiences drew me to centenarians, and on to supercentenarians and their stories.

Link to the thumbnails http://www.markstoryphotography.com/tns.php

This review on the site gives a bit more background on how the photos were made and something of the people.
http://www.markstoryphotography.com/review-missindependent.php

Site Search Tags: centenarian, super centenarian, BoingBoing, nonagenarian

Salvation Army center lauded for dementia care program

The Salvation Army Serendipity Adult Day Center in Anchorage has received the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America award as an “Excellence in Care Dementia Program of Distinction.” The Salvation Army center is the first adult day care to receive the national honor. The center offers meaningful activities daily to about 30 adults with special needs, the foundation said. The award “validates what I feel is the culmination of years of hard work constantly trying to be on the cutting edge of new and innovative ideas in working with individuals who live with dementia and their families,” said Jesalyn Stanton, the center’s executive director. [...]
Published: January 1st, 2008 http://www.adn.com/money/story/251697.html

• http://tinyurl.com/2zohlb Serendipity Day Center website

Press release

NEW YORK, NY – The Alzheimer’s Foundation of America (AFA) recently awarded its “Excellence in Care Dementia Program of Distinction” status to the nation’s first adult day center and three more assisted living facilities that have achieved AFA’s nationwide standard of excellence for facilities that provide care to individuals with Alzheimer’s disease or related illnesses. The Salvation Army Serendipity Adult Day Center, Anchorage, AK, is the first adult day center to receive the distinction. Also awarded Excellence in Care status are the memory care units within these facilities: Warwick Forest, Newport News, VA; The Catholic Care Center, Bel Aire, KS; and The Birches, Clarendon Hills, IL. [...]

For more information about Excellence in Care, visit www.excellenceincare.org or call 866-AFA-8484.

In Bethel, we’ve made some progress. Those in the day program are no longer segregated to the loft upstairs. It also seems that older people are no longer forced to enroll in the program (in order to bring in more Medicaid money). The same old puzzles and BINGO are available for everyone.

The assisted living home is still promised by the Yukon Kuskokwim Health Corp. — to open in 2005 next to the assisted living home built in 1997 by AVCP Housing and never used as such (then promised to start construction in 2006 for 2008 opening http://theelderlies.wordpress.com/2007/01/21/bethels-assisted-living-home-construction-2006/) and now promised for 2nnn

In the meantime, the City of Bethel raised the sales tax by 20% starting next week– not to fund senior programs or public transportation or disaster preparedness or public infrastructure or to keep the utility rates from going up, but for annual maintenance of a not-yet built swimming pool. As one local elite stated, the poor and elders won’t feel the regressive tax because they get food stamps.

The tax increase won’t go towards any improvement in “community policing” either. Bethel relies heavily on the police to do the things neighbors, family, and friends would rather not. There are now 3 police officers, instead of 12. The elder abuse hot line [1-800-478-9996] was forewarned last August when this became obvious. Unfortunately, the State of Alaska elder abuse hotline is just one person, although assisted by one or two field investigators.

Site Search Tags: YKHC, day center, Salvation Army, Alzheimer’s, Chrissie Shantz Adult Day Center

“All my life, that’s what I’ve wanted to do – hit that ball,” said Hashim Khan, one of the sport’s all-time greats.

Khan recently took a tumble on the court, fracturing a hip and straining a rotator cuff. Doctors have said no more squash.

He refuses to listen.

Even at 93, Khan can’t bring himself to lay down his racket – he simply loves the game too much.

And squash – a game similar to racquetball – has given him so much in return. He’s travelled the world, found fame by winning seven British Open titles and become a national hero in Pakistan, his homeland…. He also started a stretch during which he or a member of his family won 13 straight British Open championships, considered the most prestigious squash tournament. [...] http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/OtherSports/2007/12/28/4743861-ap.html

See also the resources at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hashim_Khan

I know next to nothing about squash but I do know his name.

FCA RELEASES PROCEEDINGS FROM NATIONAL CONFERENCE:
“FAMILY CAREGIVING: STATE OF THE ART, FUTURE TRENDS”

The National Center on Caregiving at Family Caregiver Alliance has released Proceedings from its March 2007 national conference, “Family Caregiving: State of the Art, Future Trends.” The conference was convened in Chicago by FCA in partnership with the American Society on Aging.

The complete Conference Proceedings are now available on the FCA website at http://caregiver.org/caregiver/jsp/content_node.jsp?nodeid=2043 (copy and paste this link into your browser), or at: Conference Proceedings. There is no charge to access the Proceedings, which detail the wide-ranging presentations and summarize trends, policy issues and progress in the field.

At the conference, experts from research, policy and practice considered critical questions in long-term caregiving: What is different now than in the past? How can we address the key challenges for family care in the decades ahead?

The Proceedings, which cover both plenary sessions and workshop panel presentations, conclude with a summary of recommendations put forth in the various sessions.

The Jacob and Valeria Langeloth Foundation, The U.S. Administration on Aging, the John A. Hartford Foundation, and The Caregivers Initiative, Johnson & Johnson, provided essential support.

Now celebrating its 30th Anniversary, Family Caregiver Alliance unites research, policy and practice to support and sustain the important work of families and friends caring for loved ones with chronic, disabling health conditions. The National Center on Caregiving at Family Caregiver Alliance was established in 2001 to advance the development of high-quality, cost effective programs and policies for caregivers in every state in the country. Visit www.caregiver.org</a> for more information.

Frank Greve of McClatchy Newspapers says, “The remarkable thing about National Public Radio senior news analyst Daniel Schorr, 91, who only recently gave up tennis, and Landrum Bolling, 94, the globe-trotting director at large for the relief agency Mercy Corps, is the same: They aren’t as remarkable as you’d think they are.

A surprising decline in disability rates among older Americans since the 1980s is enabling millions more to lead longer, richer, spryer lives. … older Americans typically are disability-free for the roughly 10 months of life expectancy that were added from 1992 to 2003.

…According to Dr. Eileen Crimmins, a professor of gerontology and sociology at the University of Southern California, 25 percent of Hispanic and black Americans older than 65 need help with basic tasks. For whites, the rate is 17 percent. Differences in disability rates linked to income and education also persist, Crimmins and others have found, and while women live longer than men, they endure more disabilities. [...]

Growing Older May Be Getting Easier, Tuesday 11 December 2007

http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/121107HB.shtml

Site Search Tags: nonagenarian, gerontology, lifespan, exercise

There are several interesting things about the non-profit compared to Bethel’s–

• the senior center is run by the organization which is composed of those over 55 years of age

In Bethel, older people were not allowed to participate in the senior center transfer from City to tribe (both groups said elders are unable to run their own center).

• their operating budget is about half of Bethel’s

Their By Laws and Policies are on-line as are the extensive membership benefits, staff list, events, dance bands (including KOLIGANEK RIVER BAND), etc. They even have a nonagenarian club.

Anchor-Age Center is a non-profit corporation. Anchor-Age Center was incorporated effective August 31, 1981 with the State of Alaska.

Mission Statement

Anchor-Age Center is a non-profit organization that operates the Anchorage Senior Center. The Anchorage Senior Center enhances the quality of life for people 55 years old and older in the Anchorage Bowl and serves as a resource:

1. To encourage independence through socialization and the promotion of healthy lifestyles;
2. To assure that all seniors in the Community are aware of the various services for seniors at the Center and in the community; and
3. To provide a central meeting place for senior organizations and others.

Operations

Anchor-Age’s purpose is to improve living conditions for elderly. To advance that purpose Anchor-Age Center operates the Municipality of Anchorage’s Senior Center by providing seniors with access to services and information key to senior living, health and housing. Anchor-Age members enjoy other benefits such as instruction in crafts, arts, computers, and fitness. Members can also take advantage of recreational pursuits such as billiards, cards, dancing, monthly birthday party, and other social events.

A voting member of Anchor-Age must be 55 years old or more. Associate members can be any age. Dues are paid annually.

Anchor-Age Center must engage in fund raising activities to cover the approximately $350,000 annual operating obligation. Anchor-Age operates a restaurant, a gift shop, catering services, individual room and facility rental as funding raising tools. Anchor-Age also sponsors fund raising with annual community events such as the fall bazaar, spring plant sale, book sales, raffles, and monthly events such as dances.

http://anchorageseniorcenter.org/aacpage.htm

Safe sex for older people is a major concern of A Little Red Hen http://alittleredhen.typepad.com/a_little_red_hen/ who has been reminding people with her condom amulets.

2007-11-30 [revised] Stop the ‘tubes! A Little Red Hen has a new blogzine announced here–
Knit A Condom Amulet, the Blogzine

and click image to see the new site–

Fortunately, there has been recent news coverage about the need for HIV and STD testing, and practicing safe sex, by those over 50.

Experts and older patients are teaching a belated lesson to battle a risky HIV generation gap that has left many unprotected and infected.
By P.J. Huffstutter, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
November 26, 2007

…although the number of HIV and AIDS patients in the over-50 crowd nationwide had grown in recent years, some of the increase was attributed to people who are living longer with the virus or disease, thanks to improvements in therapy treatments.

But without widespread testing, “we don’t really know what the true prevalence [of STD infection] is in this group,” Lieb said. “There’s reason to think, at least anecdotally, this is a combustible situation that is being overlooked.”

That’s why some social service and public health officials have turned to HIV-positive patients like Fowler to speak out and try to get their peers’ attention…. Fowler recently met up with a graying group to commiserate about sexually transmitted diseases, and recounted her cautionary tale. How a divorce in her 50s led her back into the dating pool, and how she enjoyed a New Year’s Eve fling with a former co-worker. Fowler said she never considered using condoms, given that she had already gone through menopause.

“I had lived what I considered a conventional, traditional life. I had been a virgin on my wedding night in 1959,” said Fowler, a founder of the National Assn. on HIV Over Fifty, who now coordinates the speakers bureau at a local AIDS organization. She has spoken before hundreds of groups over the years, including medical researchers and HIV/AIDS advocates to senior centers.

“I remained monogamous for 23 years of marriage. . . . After the divorce, I didn’t consider myself promiscuous. I didn’t frequent the singles bars. I went out with men my age who, like me, had been married and were divorced.”

Her own physician, she said, dismissed her questions about getting tested for HIV as unnecessary for someone her age. Her early symptoms were dismissed as routine ailments of aging.

Read the rest at

• http://www.latimes.com/news/la-na-safesex26nov26,0,6247855,full.story?coll=la-tot-topstories

• http://www.hivoverfifty.org/

The National Association on HIV Over Fifty (NAHOF) was founded at the National Conference on AIDS and Aging in October of 1995 in New York City. Our mission is to promote the availability of a full range of educational, prevention, service and health care programs for persons over age fifty affected by HIV.

People over age fifty are affected by HIV in numerous ways. People in their mid or later years may be infected with HIV, the virus associated with AIDS. Ten percent of all AIDS cases are persons age fifty and up, a quarter of these are over age 60. Older women appear to have higher incidence rates than older men, and persons of color are especially at risk.

AIDS and HIV affect families, both traditional and families of choice. Increasingly older adults care for relatives and friends infected with HIV. Many adults with HIV turn to older parents for help and care. Increasingly grandparents are substitute parents for their grandchildren whose own parents are unable to care for their children due to HIV-related needs. Many of these are “AIDS orphans” and grandparents have stepped in to be full or part time caregivers for the children; middle-age and older adults with adult children may need emotional support….

Older people with HIV/AIDS face a double stigma: ageism and infection with a sexually-or-IV-drug transmitted disease.
http://www.hivoverfifty.org/tip.html

Safe sex is needed especially in what seems to be a new tourism–

By Jeremy Clarke, Sun Nov 25, 2007
Older white women join Kenya’s sex tourists

MOMBASA, Kenya (Reuters) – Bethan, 56, lives in southern England on the same street as best friend Allie, 64….

Hard figures are difficult to come by, but local people on the coast estimate that as many as one in five single women visiting from rich countries are in search of sex.

Allie and Bethan — who both declined to give their full names — said they planned to spend a whole month touring Kenya’s palm-fringed beaches. They would do well to avoid the country’s tourism officials.

“It’s not evil,” said Jake Grieves-Cook, chairman of the Kenya Tourist Board, when asked about the practice of older rich women traveling for sex with young Kenyan men.

“But it’s certainly something we frown upon.”

Also, the health risks are stark in a country with an AIDS prevalence of 6.9 percent. Although condom use can only be guessed at, Julia Davidson, an academic at Nottingham
University who writes on sex tourism, said that in the course of her research she had met women who shunned condoms — finding them too “businesslike” for their exotic fantasies.
[...]

• http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSL1434216920071126

Site Search Tags: sex, safe sex, HIV, AIDS, STDs, condom, condom+amulet, ALittleRedHen, EHSC, Bethel, tourism, travel

This program is designed to encourage and promote the creation or expansion of services for grandparents and other relatives who have taken on the responsibility of surrogate parenting due to the absence of the parents. The program awards seed grants of $10,000 over a two-year period in two categories: local agencies and state public agencies. Deadlines Local proposals are due January 10, 2008 and State proposals are due by February 8, 2008. For more information see http://www.epa.gov/aging/index.htm#2007_0110_grant_1

National Center on Senior Transportation: Requests for Proposals for Demonstration Grants Deadline December 17, 2007

The National Center on Senior Transportation is soliciting proposals from aging/human service agencies, tribal organizations, faith-based organizations, units of state and local government, public and private transportation providers and other entities interested in developing and implementing innovative approaches to increasing senior transportation options and improving older adult mobility. Successful projects will be collaborative, replicable, and consistent with senior transportation-related goals of the national United We Ride initiative of the Federal Transit Administration. The goals are to: 1.Increase transportation options for older adults; 2. Simplify older adults’ access to transportation services; and 3. Increase the quality of transportation services for older adults. Successful applicants will receive grant awards ranging from $50,000 – $90,000. For more information see http://www.seniortransportation.net

Proposals are due Deadline Monday, Dec. 17, 2007, and should be submitted electronically via email to twilson AT n4a DOT org or using the online form which can be reached through the center’s Web site ( http://www.seniortransportation.net). Electronic or online submission is preferred but hard copies will be accepted. Hard copies of the proposal must be received on or before Dec. 17, 2007. The mailing address is Tabitha Wilson, Assistant Director, NCST, 1730 Rhode Island Ave., NW, Suite 1200, Washington, D.C. 20036

Site Search Tags: grants, deadline, proposals, Brookdale, transportation, grandparents, EPA+Aging+Initiative

• http://theelderlies.wordpress.com/special-projects/photo-index-cking-wwii/

However, because comments and pages have separate notifications on the Internet, I thought I would also post a separate notice, especially for those who read this web log with an RSS feed reader.

The latest published film was televised last week on the US Public Broadcasting System, Independent Lens. The film focuses on intimate interviews with Bill and Andy, the film explores what it means to be a soldier then and now. And for Bill, that means continuing the battle—even at the cost of his own peace of mind. and not on the battle details, per se. However, there is fascinating blended footage from the present day terrain morphing into the WWII terrain (actual footage or photos of the battle).

It is also a good presentation of the mixed emotions (and some rather unmixed) of veterans of the Pacific war. I had an uncle in Attu (Claude I. Green) who never spoke much of the Aleutian horror– part of the horror was the transfer from the tropical Marshall Islands to Attu without a change in uniforms (he was in the Navy). The monument is dedicated to all in the campaign (the necessity of which is also controversial still, as is the forced removal and internment of Alaskans by the USA.)

Aleutian Island documentary RED WHITE BLACK and BLUE is going to have a special one-hour broadcast on PBS November 6, and it’s going to be released on home video on November 7. We’re also finishing up some community screenings around the country, mostly in Florida, Michigan, and Indiana.

You can click the link below to read more about the film, get a list of upcoming local screenings, and broadcast information for your area, as well as information about how to purchase the film.

Thanks so much, and if you do get a chance to see the film we’d love to hear your thoughts.

Take care,
Tom Putnam

Here’s their website, http://www.alaskainvasion.com/

The Independent Lens website has a summary, several references to additional information, and a viewer feedback. Read more about the making of RED WHITE BLACK & BLUE »

See also previous
John Huston movie from the Aleutians
Al-Can Highway and the Aleutians War, Alaska in WWII

Site Search Tags: WWII, Attu, Aleutians, Unalaska, Dutch+Harbor, Japan, Aleut, Unangan, Charlie+King, PBS, Independent+Lens, video, documentary, oral+history, archives, DVD

By Elizabeth Douglass, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
November 10, 2007

Forty years ago, Harold Hay came up with a way to heat and cool homes using water and the sun….

Now 98, Hay is making what he knows will be his final push.

The retired chemist promotes his cause by funding research. He vents his frustration in letters, e-mails, phone messages to anyone who will listen, and on his own website,

• www.2and50needles.com

“The main point that he’s trying to make now is that all of our hopes are pinned on all of these complicated technologies, and it’s not that complicated. We could solve a lot of the problems by building our buildings correctly.”

Hay calls his invention the Skytherm system, and it was a wonder in the 1960s because it used the sun to heat and cool a home. The earliest version operated without any electricity, making it a purely passive solar technology.

Skytherm was the first of what’s known today as a roof-pond system….

Hay says he spearheaded the creation of the St. Louis Progressive Party, which helped get him labeled a communist. He came up with a chemical to purify drinking water, and he found a way to chemically toughen fiberboard to broaden its use. During World War II, the self-proclaimed pacifist worked on the development of synthetic rubber to avoid military service and jail. Along the way, almost as a hobby, Hays did groundbreaking research in the origins of medicine. [...]

Read the very interesting article here
http://www.latimes.com/news/la-fi-haroldhay10nov10,0,3607880.story

His website is
This series of Needles is written by Harold R. Hay, Trustee, H.R. & E.J. Hay Charitable Trust, Los Angeles, CA. at the age of 97. Fifty years of dedicated research in solar energy, plus prior successes in government, industry and academia permit a broad evaluation of reasons why solar energy (not renewable energy – a culprit) is not more uniformly accepted. The fault is with all involved – including me.

Site Search Tags: science, solar, energy, environmental+change, nonagenarian, elderblogger

Reuters | Friday, 2 November 2007
Paul Tibbets, the pilot of the US bomber that dropped the first atomic bomb on Japan on Aug 6, 1945, died on Thursday at age 92, a newspaper reported.

Tibbets, who died at his home in Columbus, Ohio, had suffered strokes and was ill from heart failure, the Columbus Dispatch said in its online edition.

An experienced pilot who had flown some of the first bombing missions over Germany during World War 2, Tibbets was a 30-year-old colonel commanding the Enola Gay, a B-29 Superfortress bomber named for his mother <http://www.stuff.co.nz/4259151a12.html

Pilot Who Dropped A-Bomb on Hiroshima Dead at Age 92 – Cleveland Leader

and others,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/secondworldwar/story/0,,2203557,00.html

General Paul Tibbets, pilot of the Enola Gay, dies at 92International Herald Tribune
Hiroshima bomb pilot dies aged 92BBC News
Hiroshima bomber dies at 92 TV3 News
Bloomberg

all 292 news articles

Tibbets was just the pilot, but certainly a more approachable person than the massive Manhattan Project. Unfortunately, the Hiroshima airdrop has to be put into the historical context of the Tokyo air raids and the Dresden air raids, as well as the Bataan campaign, Nankin, the Aleutians, etc. No wonder the 20th century experienced the worst mass disasters, maybe even given the smaller world population of earlier times, such as the Black Death. Maybe excepting whatever the Africa bottleneck was that supposedly reduced all humankind to just a handful of mothers.

Site Search Tags: WWII, nonagenarian, pilot, war