Emmett Myhre turns 100

CHRIS PETERSON / Hungry Horse News

Longevity is a simple formula, said Emmett Myhre.

"Live a clean life," he said last week. "I never smoked. I'm not a boozer. I might have had a high ball if I went out to dinner. And don't eat a lot of junk food."

Myhre, who's just as lucid as any 20-year-old, turned 100 last Sunday. He was born in Lidgewood, N.D. but lived most of his life in South Dakota.

"My parents moved to South Dakota when I was a babe in arms," he said.

His father operated a creamery and was the victim of a bank failure during the Depression. So Myhre made it through college the hard way — he worked a year and then went to school and then got a job until he had enough money to pay for more tuition.

In the end, he ended up with a degree in mechanical engineering from South Dakota State University. Two weeks out of school Myhre had his first job with the local power company. He would later get a job at the Hoover Dam and then in January 1950, the Bureau of Reclamation transferred him to the Hungry Horse Dam.

He worked there for 21 years. He was named superintendent of the dam in 1961 and retired in 1971. He lived in Hungry Horse most of his dam years, save for a few months before he retired.

"I've been retired longer than I've worked," he said with a big grin.

He was good friends with Mel Ruder, the founder of the Hungry Horse News.

"I knew Mel Ruder real well," he said. "He used to come out once a week to see what was going on with the project (the dam). He was a real swell guy."

Myhre's name often appeared in stories about the dam, recalled Columbia Falls resident Bill Dakin.

"He was a household name," Dakin said at a birthday party hosted by the Kalispell Noon Rotary last week. Myhre has been the Sergeant-in-Arms for the Club for 40 years.

Myhre still gets around and does his own shopping and other chores. He lives alone and just stopped driving a few weeks ago. He was married to his wife Maybelle for 56 years. They were high school friends, but "the romance didn't bloom until after I graduated from college."

In high school and in college, Myhre explained he didn't have the time or money to spend on women.

The couple had no children but Myhre's name will not be forgotten.

Fellow Rotarian Lisa Ludahl named her son Emmett after the centenarian.

"He's been a longtime customer," she explained. "I knew he and his wife were never able to have kids and I thought his name should live on."

Ludahl works at First Interstate Bank in Kalispell in the Trust Department and Myhre has been her customer every week for 15 years.

For years Myhre was an avid piano player, though he recently gave his grand piano to the Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Kalispell. Arthritis in his hands ended his piano playing.