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Forever-Young Seniors Reveal Secrets To Longer Living On ABC News Special

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By WALT BELCHER

The Tampa Tribune

Published: April 1, 2008

The good news is people may one day live to be 150.

The bad news is, by then, retirement age will be 120, Social Security will be bankrupt and while Willard Scott may still be around to wish you a happy birthday, you probably won't be able to afford a jar of Smucker's.

On an ABC News special, "Live to Be 150 ... Can You Do It?" (10 tonight), Barbara Walters explores the latest anti-aging research.

Walters, 78 and still going strong, also profiles some people who are alive and kicking in their senior years. Among them:

•Actor Paul Newman, 83, who has retired from the screen but has continued to compete in auto racing. His appearance might help quiet rumors that he has been secretly battling cancer and has only months to live.

•Fashion model Carmen Dell'Orefice, who at age 76 is the world's oldest working model. She credits her longevity to a healthy interest in sex, a balanced diet and a positive attitude. (Check out her photograph at

TBO.com, keyword: Walt TV).

•Leonard Rosie Ross, a 102-year-old man who performs as a trumpeter at an Arizona resort.

•Lillian Cox, a 101-year-old Tallahassee socialite who has owned a clothing store, raised a daughter, held the title of Florida's Woman of the Year and traveled the world.

•Frank Shearer, a 101-year-old water skier and retired physician from Washington state.

Walters also looks at various ways people are trying to defeat aging, such as cloning, cryonics, stem-cell research, drug therapies and diet modifications.

Among the places Walters visits is the Alcor Life Extension Foundation in Arizona, where people have paid upward of $150,000 to be frozen when they die because they feel there will come a time when they can be revived and cured.

"We've been working on this for two years," Walters says, "because we think the subject of longevity is very much on people's minds. In terms of people living longer, there have been more advancements in the last 30 years than there have been in the last 5,000 years. There are almost 84,000 people in this country right now who are over 100 years old, and it is estimated that 1.2 million baby boomers will live to be 100."

Walters also visits a lab where blood is developed from stem cells that could lead to a future in which people will replace old body parts like replacing used parts on a car.

KATHIE LEE RETURNS: When Kathie Lee Gifford came to Tampa this year to help kick off the play "Hats! The Musical," she hinted she might be returning to television.

On Monday, NBC made it official. Gifford, 54, is joining "Today" as co-host (with Hoda Kotb) of the fourth hour. She starts April 7.

Gifford, best known as former co-host of "Live With Regis and Kathie Lee," with Regis Philbin from 1985 to 2000, is a former singer. Since leaving "Live," she has been writing musicals and performing.

She wrote two of the songs in "Hats! The Musical," which is playing at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center through May 11. The play was inspired by the Red Hat Society, which celebrates older women.

Gifford joked Monday on "Today" that she picked a fine time to return to TV because she is eight years older, 10 pounds heavier and a half-inch shorter - and she'll be in high definition.

She also joked that she was getting tired of staying home and watching husband Frank Gifford's old highlight reels from his football career with the New York Giants.

NBC's fourth hour of "Today" (without Matt Lauer or Meredith Vieira) is struggling in the ratings.

TUNE IN TONIGHT

American Idol, 8 p.m., Fox

The Iron Butterfly, Dolly Parton, 62, shows those whippersnappers a thing or two. She comes back Wednesday to sing "Jesus & Gravity," off her new "Backwoods Barbie" album.

Hell's Kitchen, 9 p.m., Fox

Another group of wannabe chefs gets browbeaten and belittled by superchef Gordon Ramsay in this reality competition.

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