BEVERLY — World War II veteran Louis Tanzer is among the last of a generation. But he’s still always first to a punch line.
The 105-year-old was greeted by family, friends, and many strangers at his birthday celebration in his Tyler Road home on Dec. 26. There were reporters, first responders, local leaders and state officials gathered around his chair, including a representative from Gov. Maura Healey’s office who read him a commendation.
“Will that reduce my taxes?” he asked once she was finished.
His deadpan wit has carried him far since he was born on Christmas Day in 1920. So far, in fact, that he is now most likely the oldest living Marine in the nation.
“When you get this old, you can’t choose how you’re gonna feel the next day,” Tanzer told The Salem News at his dining room table last week. “But I’m here.”
Tanzer was born in Peabody to Jewish immigrants from Russia and Romania.
It was a tough upbringing for him during the Great Depression. His father died when Tanzer was a young boy and his sister had to move in with a friend because the family was so poor. Sometimes, the Tanzers wouldn’t eat at all in a day.
“The neighbors, some of them had big gardens. We used to raid them to get an apple or a pear,” he said.
Tanzer graduated from Peabody Veterans Memorial High School, then just Peabody High School, in 1938. He enlisted in the Marines in 1942 after he’d been rejected by the Navy for being too thin.
Lucky for him, the weight requirement for the Marines was 120 pounds. He weighed 121.
Tanzer could have received a deferment because his mother, who was completely deaf, relied on his income. But he followed in his older brother’s footsteps.
“Friends of mine were going in and my conscience was bothering me, so I enlisted at the same time they all went,” he said.
Soon, Tanzer was shipped out to a base on Funafuti, an atoll in the South Pacific. He moved around the Ellice Islands and Marshall Islands until the end of the war.
He reached the rank of Staff Sergeant in the 4th Marine Aircraft Wing and served on the USS Altamaha, a Liberty Ship that ferried U.S. troops and supplies around the Pacific.
“There were bloody battles,” he said.
Tanzer was assigned submarine watch on his ship their first night at sea. A storm hit, turning the ocean into churning tub water, he recalled.
“I got sick as a dog,” Tanzer said. “(My relief) was stuck on double duty, so I just said the heck with this and laid down on the deck.
“They tried to sink us, but I lived through that all right. From then on, I don’t know if you get fearless, but your tour of duty is just an ordinary thing once you’re out there and in danger,” he said.
After the war, Tanzer came back to Peabody and worked in the city’s tanneries, which he would do until retirement. He married his late wife Roslyn Fliegel in 1951 and went on to have two children with her, a daughter Gail and son Jeff. They moved to Beverly in 1960 and later enjoyed traveling around the world.
Other than relying on hearing aids and a walker, and suffering from tinnitus, he’s in pretty good shape at 105 — nearly two decades older than when he first was diagnosed with COPD from inhaling the polyurethane used in making patent leather shoes.
“You can see the scarring on X-rays, but he talked himself out of COPD,” his daughter said. “He doesn’t use oxygen tanks and he doesn’t take medications for it. He’s a specimen.”
Tanzer didn’t seem to expect the commotion that came with his birthday this year. Thanks to Danvers couple Bridget and David Ball, he’s received more than 1,000 cards from people around the country, Challenge Coins from fellow veterans including a Medal of Honor recipient, a card signed by all of the players on the New England Patriots, his own customized Patriots jersey and a video call with the team’s owner, Robert Kraft, wishing him a happy birthday.
“We just wanted to honor him and get him 105 cards for his birthday,” Bridget Ball said. “It’s turned into this amazing thing, and he deserves it. He’s a very humble man.”
The Balls volunteer for the Beverly Veterans Council. The agency wanted to honor Tanzer as the city’s oldest living veteran with a plaque and sent the Balls to Tanzer’s home to run the idea by him.
He was skeptical at first, thinking they might be trying to scam him. But after a phone call to the city’s veterans agent and weekly visits with the Balls, they’ve become his good friends.
A veteran himself, David Ball put out a call for birthday wishes for Tanzer around Christmas. Posts on Facebook went viral, and letters started pouring in.
“I started with the President and worked my way down asking for recognition for him,” he said. “Most recently, I emailed with the Gary Sinise Foundation, who is recognizing him, and the Navy SEAL Museum in Florida sent him a card. It’s just incredible.”
The Balls researched if Tanzer is the oldest living veteran in the country. One man in Alabama has him beat by about six months, they found. But he was in the Navy.
“I believe he is the oldest living Marine veteran,” Bridget Ball said.
Tanzer didn’t have much advice for people looking to live as long as him. What he did say harkened back to growing up in the Great Depression.
“Don’t eat.”
Contact Caroline Enos at CEnos@northofboston.com.