My grandfather was born in the late 1800's and lived to be over 100 years old. He farmed along with my grandmother. They only had my dad and his older sister and never had hired help. He raised meat birds, Angus cattle and hogs. He ate big meals, fried foods, liked a few sweets, always had tea cookies in the cookie jar and some of those soft peppermint sticks in a box he gave the grandkids. Nope, no hired help here. And he stayed on that farm until late in his 90's, way after his wife died, all alone, until he became almost deaf and a tad feeble and his daughter insisted he go live with her in Alabama. I think that pretty much killed his will to live. He probably would have made it a couple of years longer if he hadn't left the farm. He walked everywhere with his walking stick, wearing a flannel shirt, overalls and a pith helmet, rarely still for a minute.
