Kingdom Daily News
February 12, 1980
Peter Bax passes his personal centennial today
by Jane Flink
Kingdom Daily News Staff
In 1880, when Peter Bax was born in Miller County, there were more than 50,000,000 people living in 38 United States. Thomas Alva Edison was granted a patent on the incadescent electric lamp and the devine Sarah Bernhardt lit up New York City's Great White Way, appearin in a play by Alexandre Dumas.
New Machinery doubled the production of corn and wheat between 1860 and 1880 - it was to double again by 1900.
For Peter Bax, 100 years old today, the affairs of the great world were secondary to the every day concerns of a mid-Missouri farm boy.
The son of Sophie and Joseph Bax of St. Elizabeth, he grew up with four sisters and four brothers, roaming the county lanes with a fishing pole balanced on one shoulder - creeping through tall timber with his brother Ben, on long, fall afternoons when the leaves lay soft and yellow underfoot and there were squirrels for the taking. And chores to keep up with on the family farm.
The memories are dim now and the farm seems far away form the glass and chrome and vinyl of the geriatrics ward at Fulton State Hospital where Peter has lived for the last five years.
It's hard for him to hear what strangers have to say in the middle of a winter afternoon when he's tired from birthday preparations. But he's resigned, in a good-humored way, to accepting whatever they have in store for him.
"Who's that lady?" he asks Social Worker Sharon Thompson, gesturing toward a visitor.
"That's the lady from the newspaper," Thompson tells him. "she's going to put your picture in the paper for your birthday."
Peter makes a face.
"Well do whatever you want to do," he says.
Peter and his wife Mary had 12 children. Nine of them survive.
Mary died in 1955. After 50 years of marriage he moved to Callaway county to live with his daughter Veronica Gerling in New Bloomsfield. Son Fred lves in Minnesota, son Lambert in Texas. Daughters Rosemary Morgan and Hilda Fisher are in Jefferson City. Paulene Burns lives in Holt Summit, Lucille Hart in Eldon and Marie Allen in Illinois.
"Don't forget Peter," he says.
"That's right. Peter Bax Jr. He's your namesake," Thompson says. Peter nods, satisfied that the list is complete.
He brightens. "What about Ben?"
Nobody seems to know who Ben is.
"My brother Ben," Peter says. "He's older than I am. We used to do all kinds of things. But I don't know if he got married. I'm going to have to study that."
Peter takes several long drags on a big cigar and blows smoke with gusto. Thompson says he told her that cigar making is his favorite hobby. Maybe his only hobby. A working man doesn't have time to develop fancy hobbies - not with nine children to support.
"I was a carpenter," he says, proudly. He looks at Thompson. "did you tell her who taught me to be a carpenter?"
Thompson admits she didn't.
"My brother-in-law Henry Dickneite," he says. "That's who taught me." There's a story about Henry teaching Peter to be a carpenter - but he can't remember it right now.
Daughter Veronica remembers her father's work took him away from the family a lot of the time. Sometimes he came home only on weekends.
He was a quiet, middle-sized man, she says, who loved to hunt and fish, bringing home squirrels and fine wild turkey and fish fresh from the deep places along the Osage River and the cloud-reflecting waters of the Big Tavern Creek.
At the hospital, his face reflecting in wide windows, Peter studies birthday cards received from members of the family. He recognizes the names of grandchildren - a Herculean task. There are 47 of them - 134 great-grandchildren - 18 great, great grandchildren. He goes over the cards again and again. He complains about his eyesight but he reads the small print without glasses.
"Have a blessed birthday," he says. "That's what this one says."
At the big birthday party tomorrow the clan will gather -as many of them as can. Peter says he doesn't much care what kind of food they serve. "I like squirrel, and I've eat a many of 'em," he says. "But I'm not particular."
"Yeah it's my hundredth birthday," he says, as if the words have little application to the long, long trail that winds from a farm in Miller County the year the Republicans elected James Abram Garfield to the presidency.
A long, long trail to a hundredth birthday party with all the family gathered round a wheel chair in a hospital ward where President Jimmy Carter and Governor Joseph Teasdale and Representative Joe Holt address their congratulations and make all the relatives proud.
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