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Carolina Life | 90-something sisters still in prime time
If living a long life is in the genes, then the Anderson sisters got a heaping helping of heredity.
Rebecca Callcott, 99, and Nancy Self, 95, helping Rebecca put on her necklace — along with surviving sisters, 97-year-old twins Frances “Frank” Hart of Conway and Mary Motte Herbert of Johns Island — still are living active lifestyles.
The sisters grew up in Ninety Six. Their father was three months shy of his 108th birthday when he died.
Nancy, widowed in 1955, and Rebecca — or “Bec,” as Nancy calls her — have lived together since the early 1970s, after Rebecca’s husband died. They now live at Still Hopes Episcopal Retirement Community in West Columbia, and according to some of their friends, they are hard to keep up with.
Rebecca is the reader; Nancy is the goer. Nancy still drives, so the two go to their circle meeting at Washington Street United Methodist Church and various other activities. In January, they drove to the polls and voted, using electronic voting machines for the first time.
Rebecca likes sitting and reading a good book or magazine and keeping up with current events. Nancy, on the other hand, loves playing bridge with friends, going to her exercise class, going to a history class and working at the gift shop. They walk together on the trail at Still Hopes.
Friends marvel at their good health and have said that if they need a blood transfusion, they “want it from Nancy and Bec.”
The sisters say they don’t do anything special to account for their health.
“I don’t think we work in any one direction,” Nancy said. “Our dad told everyone who asked him about his age that he had a good pump,” referring to his heart.
He evidently passed his good pump down to his girls.
— Tim Dominick,