100-year-old World War II veteran shares tips for living well

By Jackie Valley

Sunday, Nov. 6, 2016 | 2 a.m.

As the vehicle carrying Vincent Shank and a banner proclaiming “99-year-old World War II Prisoner of War” rolled through Las Vegas last year, the applause intensified and the screams grew louder.

“It was like he was a celebrity,” Shank’s daughter, Nancy, said. “It was like he was the pope.”

This year, the Veterans Day Parade crowd might reach even higher decibel levels: Shank turned 100 on Sept. 19, celebrating his triple-digit birthday with four parties — and this was after spending several summer weeks at his Hawaiian home.

Shank smiles sheepishly as his daughter rattles off his almost unbelievable accomplishments: He ran his first marathon at age 80. He exercises daily at his senior apartment complex. And despite fading eyesight and poor hearing, he only takes medication for his blood pressure.

When it comes to aging, “the tough part is losing your friends,” he said.

Shank knows a thing or two about life and loss. After the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Shank joined the United States Army Air Corps — the forerunner to the Air Force — with his sights sets on becoming a pilot. Instead, he wound up as a bombardier with the 348th Squadron of the 99th Bombardment Group, flying missions across the Mediterranean Sea from his base in Tunisia.

During his 32nd mission on July 5, 1943, German fire struck his plane, killing four crew members. The survivors jumped from the falling aircraft. It was Shank’s first time deploying a parachute.

“Is it going to work?” Shank wondered, as his body tumbled toward earth, his coveralls flapping in the wind.

It did, and he landed unharmed on a plate of cookies in the middle of a Sicilian town. Women screamed. Italian police nabbed him. Shank spent the next two years in various prison camps across Europe. En route to a camp in Germany, Shank was riding in a cramped boxcar when American bombs began raining down around a train station. A fellow prisoner escaped and freed the other men stowed inside the boxcars, though they ultimately were recaptured.

“I thought this was the end,” Shank said. “I was so frightened.”

The scene haunted him in nightmares for years to come.

At Stalag Luft III — his final POW camp — Shank played bugle and trumpet in a prisoner-formed band, subsisted largely on a turnip-like vegetable called kohlrabi and clamored for any news updates about the war.

Shank, a trained trumpet player, eventually landed in Las Vegas during the Rat Pack era. He played in house bands at bygone casinos like the Sands, Dunes, El Rancho and Silver Slipper until he retired in 1982.

He credits his good health to frequent meditation, a positive attitude, numerous hobbies and interests, and multiple vitamin supplements that line a curio cabinet inside his apartment. The centenarian also recites a daily affirmation that begins, “I’m lovable just the way I am. I deserve to be healthy and happy and fulfilled in my life …”

It’s a fitting ritual for a man whose daughter says he never complained about life’s challenges. After all, Shank witnessed manmade horrors overseas and knew his time on this planet could have been cut short.

What does he want younger generations to know? “Wars are terrible, and they don’t accomplish anything.”