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2005 Best Of Winners

Discover Mid-America — February 2007

A long life that keeps living
by Bruce Rodgers, Editor/Publisher

Bernice Holmes embraces life. She is a woman who will not be deterred. This extraordinary woman is the subject of this month’s feature story by Terri Baumgardner.

I first met Bernice about five months ago when I drove to Atchison, KS to drum up a little business. Diane Senical, owner of Beverly’s Antiques, suggested I go talk to Bernice, adding in passing that Bernice was in her 90s.

“Nineties,” I said to myself. “This woman must be something else.”

I had to admit that meeting and doing business with antique shop owners and dealers well past retirement age wasn’t all that unusual. Still, I did picture a frail woman, maybe a little hard of hearing, moving slowly around her shop, more lost in the past than thinking of the present, much less the future.

Boy, was I wrong.

I found Bernice at her desk, bantering with a customer on his way out. She greeted me politely. When I introduced myself as being with Discover Mid-America, sent down to talk to her on a suggestion from Diane, Bernice didn’t miss a beat.

“Why, this is the first time anyone from Discover has ever been to Atchison,” she said in a slightly scolding tone.

I tried to counter the comment by saying I had been to Atchison but never in her shop, “for which I apologize,” I added, trying not to sound condescending.

Didn’t matter with Bernice. I still hadn’t been to Atchison and seen her no matter how I tried to spin it, rationalize it or ignore it. I gave in…no one from Discover had been to Atchison to talk about advertising, I admitted with a throat-clearing sound of resignation.

A few weeks ago when I went to see her with Baumgardner for her interview and for me to take photos for the story, Bernice claimed she didn’t remember meeting me. I don’t know if she was pulling my leg a little or what. Not wanting to argue — never argue with a 93-year-old woman who drives to Kansas City to shop and taught herself how to operate a computer at 90 — I concluded that maybe I left such a numbing first impression that my initial visit was about as consequential as the sound of traffic from the highway in front of her shop.

As Baumgardner asked questions and I attempted to take photos — Bernice objected to the camera and the wrinkles that might be shown — I found myself marveling concerning this woman.

Would I…could I ever be like her at 93? Would I be as mentally sharp, as willing to tackle new things and go places on my own because, because I had a choice to do it that way!

Never had I met someone so fearless. Never had I met someone still, after nine decades, so excited about life, about learning. I was in awe.

As Baumgardner notes in the opening of her story, there’s something about strong, independent women coming from Atchison, KS. The town has a treasure in Bernice Holmes, and the antique business is better for it.

Bruce Rodgers can be contacted at publisher@discoverypub.com.

> Editor’s Notebook Archive — past columns