Morrie Markoff, the oldest man in the U.S., died in Los Angeles on June 3, aged 110. Unlike many people his age, and much younger, his mind was clear, he was full of life and energy and curious about everything under the sun. People like him are a rarity and are known as supercentenarians – it’s estimated there are only 150 in the world. After his death, he set another record: He donated his brain to science. It is the oldest and healthiest brain ever donated.
His 83-year-old daughter, Judith Hansen said that he once mentioned to her he wanted to donate his body to science, but she told him, “I think that all of your organs are too used up.” Then, three days before he passed away, an idea struck. “I thought, what about his brain? Everyone kept saying what a brain he has,” said Hansen. “I went online and researched brain donations, I got all the information and I announced, I would like to donate dad’s brain.”
“Everyone kept saying what a brain he has.” – Judith Hansen
Markoff was born in New York, six months before World War I, to Max and Rose Markoff, Jewish immigrants from Russia. He had three siblings and they lived in a modest 400-square-foot cold-water apartment with a shared toilet down the hall.
He moved to Los Angeles in the late 1930s to work for a vacuum cleaner company. His girlfriend, Betty Goldmintz, joined him soon after and they got married in 1938. The couple stayed together for 81 years, until Betty’s passing in 2019 at the age of 103.
“Mom and dad were the biggest walkers,” Hansen said. “They did it every single day for about three miles around Silver Lake. They also lived on a hill, so they had to go up and down the hill. A lot of people in Silver Lake knew them as this adorable couple who would hold hands and they could always count on them to be there.”
Hansen said her parents led a healthy life and only drank water, not from plastic bottles of course, which they considered toxic. “They never had soda in the house and my mom always cooked healthy. They didn’t take supplements except for vitamins C, E and D.” The biggest indulgence her father allowed himself was an occasional croissant at a neighborhood café.
Markoff was a scrap-metal sculptor and blogger (he was also considered the world’s oldest active blogger). While servicing and repairing gadgets and appliances, he looked at a toilet tank float and it reminded him of a tutu, so he began welding scrap of metal parts and created beautiful sculptures. In 2014 — at the age of 100 — he had his first exhibit at a Chinatown gallery.
He started every day by reading the Los Angeles Times and loved learning about what’s going on in the world. His daughter attributed his curiosity to his longevity. “He was always a very curious person,” she said. It’s rare to find someone who doesn’t suffer from dementia or some sort of memory loss at Morrie’s advanced age, which is why his brain is so valuable to research. His brain was donated to the Brain Donor Project and will be studied at UCLA. “They are going to write a report that is going to be sent out all over, and we’re included,” Hansen said, adding with a laugh, “I assume that I’m not going to be able to understand any of it.”
After his wife passed away, the family got him a caregiver, Rosario Reyes, who was the family housekeeper some 20 years ago. Reyes made sure to keep him busy and kept him company after most of his friends had already passed away. Also, in the past few years, he wasn’t able to walk outside his downtown apartment as he used to.
Some elderly people become lonely when their spouse and all their friends pass away, but Markoff wanted to live – and he enjoyed his life up until the end. When he celebrated his 109th birthday, his grandson Thomas brought him a belly dancer. “He also brought her back on his last birthday,” Hansen said. “My dad had a good sense of humor and when she was about to leave my dad said to her: ‘Wait a second, what kind of present is it that you bring and then take away?’”
Hansen said she adopted the same lifestyle as her parents as a formula for long and healthy life. “I walk at least three miles a day and I have lots of animals,” she said. “My parents always loved animals, and they had one or two animals generally at a time. I have lots of animals, two dogs, a cat and a crow which I befriended.”
When asked what she thinks her father would say if he knew that his brain was going to be used for research, Hansen replied, “My father loved fame. He had a very good ego. He was very proud of the fact that he was the oldest man in America. He had gotten a lot of publicity from Steve Lopez of the Los Angeles Times, who wrote about him. He published a book and a blog and loved the fact that his wonderful sculptures were being noticed. So yes, he would have been thrilled.”
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