Emily Chan
There are people who might be surprised to learn that quite a few older adults have broken some impressive world records, proving that age is just a number and it’s never too late to do something extraordinary.
Recently, a 104-year-old woman from Chicago named Dorothy Hoffner set the Guinness World Record for becoming the oldest person to go skydiving. She broke the previous record for the oldest tandem parachute jump that was set last year in Sweden by a 103-year-old.
Hoffner was born in 1918 and has experienced many major events in her lifetime, including her first skydiving attempt at the age of 100.
That’s right, Hoffner has gone skydiving before, and sometime last spring, she decided that she wanted to experience the feeling of parachuting from a plane once again. So, on October 1, she was driven from her home at the Brookdale Senior Living Center in Chicago to a skydiving center.
At first, she was not aware of the fact that she would be partaking in a record-breaking jump, but after Joe Conant, a caregiver at Brookdale and the person who introduced Hoffner to skydiving, looked into it, he invited Guinness World Record officials to attend.
Footage of her skydive quickly drew the attention of media outlets across the nation, with reporters contacting her around the clock. When asked in an interview if she had been nervous at all, she claimed that “there was nothing scary about it.” She described the fall through the air as smooth, nice, and peaceful.
About one week later, on October 9, Hoffner passed away. Her death came as quite a shock to those she was close with at Brookdale. Even at her advanced age, she remained active, continuing to engage in physical exercise and meeting new people.
Hoffner was known as a warm and curious individual. According to Conant, she made the “perfect dinner guest” because of her compelling stories involving weekend trips across the country and adventures in Mexico and Germany. She was well-liked by the people at the senior living facility and referred to the caregivers there as her children and grandchildren.
Hoffner never married or had children of her own, which she said allowed her to have more freedom. She spent her entire life in Chicago. She worked for Illinois Bell Telephone Co. and made 25 cents an hour when she first started the job. By the time she reached 104, she had spent as much time retired as she had been working.
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