Harry Landis
At the time of his death on February 4, 2008, in Sun City Center, Fla., at the age of 108, Harry Landis was one of only two remaining American World War I veterans.

Landis was born Dec. 12, 1899, on a family farm just outside of Hannibal, Mo. At eight years of age he went to work rounding up cows to milk. The seventh of eight children, he rode a horse into town to help conduct family business for the farm that is still owned by family members. Going to school was a break.

In 1917 he graduated from high school and attended Central College, now Central Methodist University, in Fayette, Mo., where he began work on a degree.

In 1918, a year after America entered the war, Landis figured he was going to be drafted so he enlisted and stayed on campus as an Army private in the Student Army Training Corps. He said the only action he saw was his sergeant ordering him to mop up after sick recruits in the make-shift sick bay on the fourth-floor dormitory where he was supposed to be learning drilling and military instruction.

Indeed, the entire region was suffering from the Spanish influenza and because of his healthy constitution, Landis stayed on as nearly all of the nurses quit. He said every morning he would wake up and go back and get the mop and bucket.

About the time Landis turned 19, the war ended and he was honorably discharged. In 1941, he signed up to fight in World War II, but was rejected for being "too old."

Returning to school at CMU, he finished his degree in physics and math and taught high school and coached football for three years before eventually becoming a manager at S.S. Kresge Co. (which later became K-Mart) in Niagara Falls, N.Y., and Dayton, Ohio.

On his 107th birthday in 2006, a reporter asked Harry “how does it feel to be 107?” He chuckled. “The same as it feels to be 105.”