Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

World’s Oldest Man Alexander Imich Takes Star Turn at 111

(Reuters) — The world’s oldest living man is a 111-year-old scholar of the occult who calls New York City his home.

Alexander Imich, who was born in Poland in 1903 and survived a Soviet Gulag, emigrated to the United States in the 1950s.

He turned 111 in February and assumed the “oldest living” title last month, according to the Gerontology Research Group of Torrance, California.

Imich is far from being the oldest living person, however. Sixty-six women are older than him, and the oldest of them, Misao Okawa of Japan, is 116.

A sparse eater whose favorite foods are chicken and chocolate, Imich said in a halting interview in his apartment on Manhattan’s Upper West Side that he credits good genes for his long life. His father, he said, lived into his 90s.

“But the life you live is equally or more important for longevity,” he said.

He grew up in a well-to-do family of secular Jews in Czestochowa in southern Poland.

Imich, who edited an anthology called “Incredible Tales of the Paranormal” in 1995 at the age of 92, says he still thinks about the future.

“There are things I would like to achieve,” he said. “But I’m not quite clear about what and how.”

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.