turning a century

SPANGLE – When people say they were born when Roosevelt was president, they usually mean Franklin.

Harry Yost can say that he was born when Theodore Roosevelt was president.

To celebrate Yost’s 100th birthday, the Eastern Washington University/Cheney SCOPE station will throw him a party today.

Yost hasn’t officially volunteered at the SCOPE station. But Terry Munro, a volunteer at the station, said that Yost is an honorary member, serving by attending parties, barbecues and other gatherings the group has. He comes to the gatherings with his son, Nathan, 73, a SCOPE volunteer.

“They let me come to everything,” Harry Yost said.

Munro said Yost’s attitude is always positive.

“You can’t meet Harry without loving him,” she said.

Yost was born in Boise on Aug. 1, 1908. He said that the doctor drove out to deliver him, but it was two weeks before his parents signed his birth certificate.

The doctor said he already mailed it. His parents only had one question.

“What’s my son’s name?” his father asked.

The doctor had decided to name the baby Harry, after the baby’s father.

Harry grew up and tried to join the military between world wars. They told him he couldn’t join the Army Air Force until he had his tonsils removed.

It was around this time he met his future wife, Ruth.

“She was a registered nurse, and I met her in the hospital,” Yost said.

Once Yost passed the physical, he said he didn’t hear back from the military for four years.

“By that time I was married, and they wouldn’t take me.”

He attended the University of Idaho and earned his bachelor’s degree in business.

“I knew I’d never work in an office,” he said. “My dad, he was a businessman, and he wanted me to be a businessman.”

Instead, he drove trucks and did some construction work for the local power company. He helped build Hoover Dam and farmed for 52 years.

“He was never out of a job,” Nathan Yost said. “Even during the Depression, Dad always worked.”

“I’d do anything,” Harry Yost said. “I never worked for anybody that wouldn’t hire me back.”

Harry and Ruth raised two children, Nathan and his sister, Arlene Coulson. They were married for 73 years until Ruth died last year.

He said that the secret for a long marriage is that “both of them got to work at it.”

One of Nathan’s favorite childhood memories of his father was when Nathan was 4 or 5.

“Dad would stand me in his fishing sack and we’d go fishing,” he said. Harry carried the fishing sack with Nathan in it on his back and they went down to the creek.

Harry showed his son how to bait the line and went to do a little fishing of his own.

“The trust he showed in me meant a lot to me,” Nathan said. “I sat there by myself.”

“I knew he knew enough not to fall in,” Harry said.

Harry and Ruth moved to the Spokane area in the early 1990s to be closer to Arlene and her husband, Jim. He now lives with Nathan near Spangle.

“Dad’s quite personable,” Nathan said. “He has a lot of friends wherever he moves.”

In addition to the party held at the SCOPE station today, Yost’s family had a birthday celebration for him a few weeks ago, one that coincided with a family reunion. He said about 60 people came, including a grandson from New York.

The Yosts aren’t sure if Harry is going to make it to his party today, since making plans is tough at his age. Once you turn 100 it gets harder to get out of the house, although he doesn’t like to make a big deal out of hitting the century mark.

“Being 100 anymore doesn’t mean anything,” he said. “I’ve lived a full life.

“I’ve had the good Lord befuddled and he didn’t know where to send me,” he said of his secret for a long life. “I guess nobody up there or down there will want me.”