Growing Bolder Community

Would You Want to Live to 100?

We're meeting people who are finding fun and freedom in smashing stereotypes. This week: a collector of everything; a daring lake swim; a second chance at life and super centenarians.

Want to know what it takes to live to 100? Read an excerpt of a book that explores that very question.

How's this for quality family time? The Shepard family, including 94-year-old great-grandmother Harriet, chose to freefall from 15,000 feet.

This former emergency room physician says America's version of preventative medicine is little more than early-detection.

It wasn't long ago that living to 100 was a monumental feat. But in most cases, the centenarian would be frail and barely aware. Times have changed! At 107, Wilhelmina Hoorn raises the bar of what's possible to a whole new level.

Maria de Jesus of Portugal passed away Friday at 115, opening the door for Gertrude Baines. She's 114, the daughter of slaves and she even voted in November for Barack Obama.

When Virginia Ferrigno's husband died, she wondered if her life was over, too. After all, they were married for close to 61 years. He was her everything. How do you go on? Virginia discovered the way.