Peter Seman of Lansford, who turned 100 on June 16, loves life.

He loves the Panther Valley, he loves good food, he loves his friends and relatives, and he loves church.

His has a positive attitude, despite losing a twin brother at a young age, enduring the Great Depression and serving in World War II.

On Saturday, about 35 friends and relatives gathered at the Lansford American Legion Post and hosted a birthday party for him. It was the third birthday party in his honor within a week. His late niece’s husband threw him a party in Wind Gap last weekend and invited his friends from Elizabeth, New Jersey, where he had lived for several decades. During the week, he was feted at a party in the Lansford Hi-Rise, where he currently lives.

Seman defies his age, walking at a quick pace with no help from a cane or any other device. He still drives a car. And Uncle Peter, as many people call him, never misses Sunday service at St. John-Baptist Catholic Church in Lansford.

What’s the secret to his long life?

“I make people laugh,” he said. “And I eat everything I’m not supposed to.”

He eats a lot of sweets, he said, especially Hershey chocolates. Two friends in Lansford, Claudia Sarge-McDonald and her husband, James, gave him 100 candy bars wrapped in ribbon.

Seman was born in Lansford, the son of the late Paul and Anna Seman. His father was one of the last miners to work in Lansford’s No. 9 deep mine. He died in 1965 from black lung.

The early years

He was born a twin, but his brother died when he was 3 months and 28 days old.

“That’s one thing I missed,” he said, dropping his head. “I missed that I didn’t get to know my brother. I was too young when he died.”

He had two sisters, Irene Lucas and Anna Piaia, both deceased.

Though he had left the area for a while, the Panther Valley has always been his favorite place.

Of Lansford, he said, “I think it’s great. Everything was like family.”

He recalled in 1929 when the stock market crashed, he was just 7 years old, but the hardships people faced were undisguisable. “Nobody was working,” he said. “They didn’t have (welfare). If you didn’t work, you did without. I always wondered how people with five, six or seven kids did it.”

He would always walk from his home at Jones and Abbott streets in Lansford to St. Michael’s Church.

“When somebody passed away in the neighborhood, it was like family. When somebody died, they laid in the parlor (of their home) if they couldn’t afford a more elaborate funeral. Everybody helped out. When someone got married, we went to church for the wedding then the neighbors prepared food and a party was held at the house.”

“In our day, Santa had nothing for you but the nice thing back then, the kids knew they were hard times and that he had nothing,” Seman recalled.

He recalls in his younger days picking huckleberries and mushrooms. He also would take buckets and pick coal that fell in the woods and along paths because finances were scarce.

People didn’t eat in restaurants much, he said. Fortunately, his mother was a great cook. She could cook Hungarian, Slovak food, American type food. She could cook anything.”

He feels the Great Depression actually lasted until Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941 and we were thrust into World War II. Until then, there was little employment. After the attack, factory production increased drastically.

Serving his country

Seman, who was never married, worked at Bethlehem Steel when the war broke out. He could have received a deferment from military service, but he felt obligated to serve with friends his age. “I wouldn’t be able to see people in church each week who wondered why I was home and their sons were fighting the war,” he said. So, he enlisted in the Army and served in Guam.

After the war he and three friends went to Elizabeth, New Jersey, looking for work and found jobs immediately. He got hired by National Gypsum Company.

His niece’s husband, Russ Futchko, who was born and raised in Coaldale but now lives in Wind Gap, said when Seman lived in New Jersey he returned to the Panther Valley regularly, sometimes every weekend. The thing he remembers most is he always returned with boxes filled with goodies - breads, cakes and other pastries - from a bakery in New Jersey.

Futchko said his sons think of Seman “like a grandfather.”

Sunday’s party at the Legion was thrown by Polly Lucas, wife of Jim Lucas. Jim had been married to Seman’s sister until she passed away.

She said she threw the party because “Uncle Pete is so wonderful. He’s a wonderful person.”

Since he returned to Lansford and moved into the hi-rise, Polly Lucas said, “He comes to our house every day, six days a week. (Sundays he goes to church). I really look forward to it.”

When he returned to Lansford, he continued making trips back to Elizabeth, New Jersey, at least every two weeks because he had “a girlfriend” there. She died at age 96, two years ago, and that’s when he stopped driving there.

Claudia Sarge-McDonald is a neighbor of Lucas. She said one reason he doesn’t show his age is, “He keeps active. He doesn’t even sit and watch TV.”

At the party, state Sen. David G. Argall popped in and presented him with certificates from the Pennsylvania Senate, Pennsylvania House of Representatives and President Joe Biden.

Members of the Lansford American Legion came and presented him with a certificate on behalf of the Carbon County Veterans Affairs, a cap and a shirt with the Legion emblem on it. The Legion members are Richard Pogwist, post adjutant; Gerald New, sergeant-at-arms and Randy Balas, a member and commander of the Vietnam Veterans of Carbon County.

One military veteran, Daniel Wehr of Summit Hill, stopped in to the party just to meet Seman.

“I heard they were having a party for a fellow veteran so I had to stop by and meet him,” Wehr said.

Wehr and Seman chatted at length about their military experiences.

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