A Century of Living

What is the secret to living a century?

Just ask Curtis Lee (C.L.) Benson. He knows the answer.

“Tend to your own business and stay focused,” he said. “There’s not too many of us out there.”

Benson celebrated his 100th birthday on October 7. His family and friends gave him a party on October 9, where he became one of the few who get the chance to blow out the candles in celebration of a century of life.

“I’m 64, and C.L. shows me there’s hope coming up to this end,” Benson’s caretaker and friend Diane Chisum said. “His mind is sharp, and he can do his laundry and his ironing on his own, as well as tell us what to do to keep us straight. He does quite well for his age.”

Benson’s long life began October 7, 1910, when he was born in Brice to Justus Lee Benson and Bertha Izella Hudson Benson.

He is the oldest of two siblings. His sister, Susie Kent, will be 99 in March.

“Yeah… I’m the oldest,” Benson said. “I’m the oldest, period.”

When Benson was 8, he moved to Clarendon and has lived here ever since.

“His parents moved them into a brick house on Sixth Street, and that’s where he grew up,” Chisum said. “He has lived on Sixth Street ever since then, just in different
houses.”

He attended school in Clarendon from first grade through college.

“I started first grade in the second floor of what now is the high school,” Benson said. “Mrs. Vaughn was my teacher, and now there’s a dorm named after her. When I was in sixth grade they moved all the primary and secondary levels out of that building and into the old saddlery by the park. Then for high school and college I returned to the current high school building. I went to Clarendon College for one year and studied engineering.”

Instead of playing the Wii or watching movies for fun, Benson and his childhood friends did other activities for entertainment.

“We would go skate on the Courthouse Square or go swimming at the YMCA,” he said. “The YMCA swimming pool was under the City Hall. It was open in the afternoon all week long except Sunday, because that’s when they drained it.”

They also discovered ways to get into trouble.

“We always hunted swimming holes,” Benson said. “We would find a pond on someone’s place and slip in. Of course they would always catch us and run us out.”

But it was not all fun and games. While growing up, Benson had many chores that are unnecessary today.

“Since I was the oldest, one of my jobs was to fire up the furnace every morning,” Benson said. “I would wake up early every morning and go out, chop the firewood and build the fire.”

He still remembers the day America won World War I.

“They blew the whistle to let everyone know it was the end of the war,” Benson said. “Everyone left school and went to [Kearney Street], and then the fun began. We all went to the courthouse square and celebrated way into the night. Most of the kids didn’t even get home until midnight.”

Benson also recalls when the Adair Hospital was running.

“Mrs. Adair built the hospital for the JA Ranch cowboys,” he said. “She wanted them to have a place to go if they ever got hurt.”
When he was older, he became a farmer with his brother Lloyd and grew many crops on the land in Brice they inherited from their father. They called themselves “The Benson Brothers.”

He retired in 1975. He still owns the land, but now he leases it out.

“All I ever knew was the farm,” Benson said. “We grew cotton, maize, a little wheat and even soybeans once. We tried peanuts, but the hogs rooted them out.”
Throughout the years, Benson has witnessed drastic innovations in the farming industry, from having field hands pick the cotton by hand to having cotton strippers and putting in his first irrigation system.

“One of the best things that happened was going from steel wheels on a tractor to rubber,” he said “That made farming a whole lot easier.”
According to Chisum, as a young farmer Benson was “the catch of the town.”

“All the girls wanted to go out with him,” she said.

He met his wife, Avis Lee McElvany at a party held by Willard and Francis Skelton.
“The whole point of the party was to get us together,” Benson said. “It was a frame up.”

He married Avis on December 24, 1941.

“For their honeymoon, they took a train to Dallas to see the football game,” Chisum said. “They loved to travel.”

They were married 40 years when she passed away in 1981.

They had two daughters together: Judith Lynn Cornell and Andrea Jill Finch.

“Avis Lee was the homemaker,” Chisum said. “She stayed home with the kids while C.L. went to work every day at the farm.”

Now, Benson has four grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

“You should’ve seen how happy he was when his great-grandchildren came to his birthday party,” Chisum said. “You can really tell how much he loves them.”

According to Chisum, Benson was completely independent until last May when he fractured his hip. Now, he requires around the clock care.

But he still continues to amaze her with his good health.

“He’s on very little medication for his age,” Chisum said. “His diabetes came about two years ago, and we have that under control. His longevity of life is golden raisins soaked in gin. It keeps him from having arthritis, and it works.”

Chisum said that Benson is a “fabulous” person, and she enjoys the time she spends with him.

“C.L. is my hero,” she said. “He is truly a huge inspiration to me.”