By Katee Underwood, Staff Writer
At 97, Charles ‘Chuck” Salisbury credits faith, family and a life of hard work for a life that has spanned nearly a century.
Salisbury will celebrate his 98th birthday Oct. 25. The Coldwater resident remains active, independent and grateful for the life he’s been given, and when Salisbury talks about turning 98, he doesn’t talk about slowing down.
“I feel pretty good, you know,” he said. “I’m highly blessed by God.”
For Salisbury, faith isn’t simply something he picked up later in life. He said God has influenced his life for many years and remains at the center of everything he does.
“God in my life. That is my true belief,” he said when asked what he considers the secret to reaching 98.
These days, Salisbury keeps busy with housekeeping and yardwork, something he has continued doing for several years. He moved to Comanche County with his wife, June, on June 2, 1992, and has called the area home ever since. But his story began much farther west.
He was born on Oct. 25, 1928, at home, in Mount Harris, Colo., a coal-mining town near Hayden, which no longer exists.
His father worked for the Victor Coal Mines.
“It was pretty much a mining camp,” he said. “You just took care of yourself.”
Army Air Corps, Air Force
At 17, Chuck enlisted in the Army Air Corps on Dec. 28, 1945. World War II fighting had ended by then, although the war was not formally declared over until 1946. He spent three years in the military and said he enjoyed his time in the Air Corps. He trained as a weather observer and teletype technician, learning to repair teletype machines and weather equipment. His service took him to Germany for three months before he was shipped to the Azores, a group of islands belonging to Portugal. He spent the remainder of his enlistment on the island of Lajes. He even still remembers some of the Portuguese language.
While he was stationed in the Azores, the Army Air Corps became the U.S. Air Force in September 1947. The change also meant a change in uniforms. Salisbury, and the men stationed with him, had been wearing Army-style uniforms, including the sun-tan uniforms associated with the Army Air Corps. When the new Air Force uniforms arrived, they were blue. The other servicemen weren’t sure what to do with their old uniforms. Salisbury boxed everyone’s up and mailed them home in two large boxes so his younger brothers could have them.
All three of his brothers eventually served in the military. One remained in the military for nearly 22 years before retiring. Nearly eight decades later, Salisbury still wears a hat bearing the name of the original Army Air Corps. And although he said he doesn’t have many memories from his earliest years, there is at least one military detail he has never forgotten. He still remembers his Army serial number.
69 Years of Marriage
Salisbury married his wife, June, on July 23, 1950. She was just 16 – 11 days past her 16th birthday – and her mother had to give permission for the marriage to take place.
The two had already become well acquainted before they married. Their dates sometimes included a chaperone. June’s mother accompanied them on many of their dates, and her younger brother, Ed Killgore, sometimes came along, too. Ed was 9 years old at the time and, according to Salisbury, he would sit directly between the young couple during their dates.
The pair was married for 69 years before June died in August 2019. Together they had six daughters, all of whom are still living. Their family has continued to grow. Salisbury counts 20 grandchildren, including their spouses, 40 great-grandchildren, including their spouses and 10 great-great-grandchildren.
Life Behind the Wheel
Salisbury spent much of his working life driving a truck. For 35 to 40 years, he hauled freight in a truck with a van trailer, carrying various types of goods. For the final 13 years, before moving to Kansas, he drove six nights a week between Farmington and Albuquerque, N.M. for the trucking division of Denver and Rio Grande Motorway. He was home during the day and back on the road at night. After moving to Kansas, he worked for Kindsvater Trucking for a couple of years.
Faith Through June
When asked what he would want people to remember about him, his answer came back to the same thing he credits for carrying him through nearly a century.
“That God influenced my life for a lot of years and everything I do,” Salisbury said.
His faith became especially important because of June. He said his wife was the reason he became a Christian. He attended the old Baptist church, in Coldwater, for years, until it closed in 2008. Afterward, he and June began attending Antioch in Buttermilk, where he occasionally preached. After June’s death, he began attending the Baptist church in Protection with one of his daughters.
Close Call at 80
His life has not been without its scares. Salisbury has also had a few reminders that a long life doesn’t necessarily mean an easy one. At 80, he was trimming trees at the old Baptist church, in Coldwater, when an accident causing him to suffer a serious head injury nearly cost him his life.
He was on a ladder cutting a branch from an evergreen tree with a chainsaw. The branch was long enough that when it struck the ground, it came back and hit him in the head, knocking him from the ladder and rendering him unconscious. But the seriousness of the injury wasn’t discovered immediately. About seven weeks later, he drove from Kansas to New Mexico, as he frequently did. During the trip and after arriving, he began feeling very sick. In the emergency room, in New Mexico, doctors discovered he had a major brain bleed. He remembers hearing people in the hospital hallway expressing disbelief that he had driven from Kansas to New Mexico that day, because he shouldn’t have made it.
Doctors performed surgery, removing part of his skull to drain and flush the bleeding and placed a shunt. There is an indention in his skull that’s still there to this day, but he survived.
When asked what he would tell his 20-year-old self if he could go back, his answer was simple, “I’d have to tell myself I was gonna live a while.”
“I didn’t think I was gonna live this long,” he said.
His parents and grandparents died in their early 70s. Salisbury had three younger brothers and two younger sisters, all of whom have since died. Most lived into their 60s, while one sister died in her early 50s.
Despite everything he’s experienced, Salisbury said he doesn’t remember having a particularly hard time himself. But he said he believes the past 10 years have been some of the hardest times he’s witnessed for other people, pointing to concerns about issues and events around the world.
