The World’s Oldest Man
The World’s Oldest Man
The Spanish village of Bienvenida in Badajoz, Spain has declared a day of mourning following the death of Francisco Nunez Olivera who was not just a retired farmer, but the world’s oldest man.
“It’s a very cold day and most of all a very sad day,” village mayor Antonio Carmona stated of Francisco Nunez Olivera who died late last month at the astounding age of 113. He is survived by four children, nine grandchildren and 15 great-grandchildren.
Photo: Gerontology.Wikia.com
Born on December 13, 1904, Olivera’s long life has been credited mainly to the vegetable based diet that was sourced from his own land accompanied by a daily glass of red wine. In fact, Spain currently has one of the highest life expectancies in the world, also attributed to the country’s Mediterranean diet. Throughout his life, he fought in the Rif War in the first half of the 1920s between Spain and the Berber tribes of the Rif mountains in Morocco and survived General Francisco Franco’s dictatorship (1936 - 1975) and was one of 32 people over the age of 90 among the nearly 2,200 inhabitants of the village, according to the newspaper, El Mundo.
Photo: Lacronicabadajoz.com
Amazingly, Olivera started to read again at 98 after an operation to cure his cataracts and took daily walks alone in his village until he was 107.
Proving Nunez Olivera’s exact age has been complicated by the fact that most of Bienvenida’s archives were destroyed during Spain’s civil war that took place from 1936 until 1939.
As a testament to the concept that age is only a number, In an April 2015 interview with Spanish daily El Mundo, Francisco said in a 2015 interview with El Mundo that he would like to live a couple more years despite the fact all his friends were dead and insisted: 'I know I'm old but I don't feel old.'
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