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Spirited seniors celebrate rare birthdays

By TIMES STAFF WRITER
Published April 5, 2007

It is a rare few who can say they've seen the new year start fresh 105 times. Joyce Haswell can.

She was born on Feb. 25, 1902 in Turner, Mich., to Edgar and Susan Samantha Durfee. Edgar was a school superintendent who often moved Joyce, her mother and the rest of the family around southern Michigan in their youth.

In the 1920s, Joyce graduated from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor with a degree in education and taught English and French and coached girls basketball.

A few years later, she met and married James "Jim" Haswell, a newspaperman with the Detroit Free Press. Joyce stayed at home to raise their two girls, Janet and Judy, who are now 75 and 80.

For 24 years, Jim worked as a Capitol and White House correspondent while Joyce was active in the Daughters of the American Revolution, the University Women's Club, worked one term for a congressman and served for a brief time as executive secretary of the National League of American Pen Women.

The Haswells moved to Dunedin in 1969, where Joyce served as president of the Suncoast Newcomers Club, was appointed to the Mayor's Bicentennial committee and was active in the Friends of the Library, Dunedin Historical Society and the Caladesi chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

The couple attended First United Methodist Church in Dunedin, enjoyed going to the theater and reading. Jim died in 1983, after 58 years of marriage.

A year later, Joyce moved to Mease Manor where she continued to be active in the community, serving as president of the Residents Association in 1987. She moved to Mease Continuing Care in Dunedin in 1998.

In celebration of her birthday on Feb. 25, she enjoyed a weekend of visits with family and friends from church, beautiful floral arrangements and special cards.

In addition to her two daughters, Joyce has seven grandchildren and a number of great- and great-great-grandchildren.

* * *

Dolores Wolf celebrated her 100th birthday on March 10 with a large party attended by family and friends and hosted by the staff of Rosewood House II in Dunedin.

Music was provided by professional singer and hospice volunteer Kim Cramer, along with John Mucciolo, a Rosewood House II resident and former professional singer from New York. Also in attendance were Dolores' son, Jim, and his wife, Shirley, from Kansas, as well as other family members from as far away as Michigan and Virginia.

Dolores was one of several siblings who grew up in Mount Clemens, Mich., and it was there at the age of 17 she took a job as assistant bank cashier at Commercial State Bank.

"I liked helping people," was her simple explanation of career choice.

While employed by the bank, she married Reuben "Bub" Wolf and had a son. Twenty years later, after she retired as a bank officer and Bub retired from the hardware business, the couple moved to Lake Highlander in Dunedin.

Bub died in 1997 at the age of 91, after 66 years of marriage.

Dolores now lives at Rosewood House II and is an avid poker player. She's lucky at bingo too.

She likes to exercise regularly and solve word games.

In addition to Jim, Dolores has three grandchildren, seven great-grandchildren and a great-great-grandchild.

Always upbeat, she had this to say about a recent gift subscription to the St. Petersburg Times, "I guess I'll have to live to be 101 so I can enjoy my paper for a year!"

[Last modified April 4, 2007, 22:15:14]