Secrets to a long, ‘lucky’ life: “Keep working” and a little red wine gets Beaufort man to 99.

Ray Stocks cannot understand why he is still around at 99. “Stay busy,” he says., ‘keep working and don’t just become a vegetable.”

And there’s this: “I take two sips of sweet red wine every morning.”

But there’s a lot more to it than that.

Maybe it’s because he lives in a bright and colorful art gallery, for all practical purposes, and that he gets along so well with the curator, his wife, Margaret, who everyone knows as Jerry. They’ve never hemmed each other in. Their little house on King Street in Beaufort’s Old Commons neighborhood was built in 1934 by local legend Buddy Lubkin. It was once home to Friends of Caroline Hospice and the Open Land Trust.

Like their home, Ray and Jerry Stocks have often reinvented themselves. For 10 years they lived aboard a 54-foot wooden Chris Craft boat with a teenage daughter. When Jerry was approaching her 60s, she became a flight attendant. Then in 2013, she earned a degree in studio art from the University of South Carolina Beaufort.

They both survived divorces, and blended a “his, hers and ours” family. He lost a son. She is a breast cancer survivor and they are both serial entrepreneurs.

She taught herself to do smocking with a McCall’s pattern and it became a career with international reach – and a bright piece of Beaufort’s fabric.. He had a full U.S. Air Force career, ending up a lieutenant colonel in the reserves. Then he was an insurance district manager. He owned a Fiat dealership on Boundary Street. He went into real estate with Heyward Spinks, and took over his youth baseball teams.

Then he got into construction. “I actually worked until I was 92 or 93,” said Ray, who still sports a thick shock of white hair.

He said he felt like doing a lot of work until two years ago when his second coronavirus vaccination laid him low. It sapped his energy and stole his breath. But he’s still chugging. In late afternoon, he puffs a cigar and reads “Everybody Lies” in a white rocking chair on the front porch, which is itself an art gallery.

Military service took him to new places and people

Ray’s military duties were mostly in radar navigation and instruction, but he flew a B-52 over the North Pole and mapped the entire Sahara Dessert.

He traveled the globe and got to meet Charles Lindbergh and Jimmy Stewart. Not bad for a kid from Leaksville, North Carolina. “Jimmy Stewart was just exactly like he was in the movies,” Ray said.

They moved to Beaufort in 1973, after meeting in the military town of Albany, Georgia, where Jerry’s Marine Corps husband had been stationed. They married and built a dream home there, complete with swimming pool.

They followed a different dream here. Jerry was born on Parris Island and as a child lived on King Street, but wasn’t so sure about leaving that dream home to come back. Her grandmother had taught her to knit when she was 7 years old. Her grandmother got an award for knitting so many helmet covers and sleeveless sweaters for soldiers in World War II, but didn’t live long enough to know what joy sewing would bring to Jerry.

Jerry did smocking for her three daughters, and then for the Parish Church of St. Helena’s annual bazaar. She ended up teaching it, and opened a retail shop called Mother Hubbard’s Cupboard. She had a wholesale design business called Cupboard Creations, wrote a book on smocking, made patterns for McCall’s, and was president of a national smocking guild she helped create.

They also had a popular business called Glad Rags and Flags that created, produced and sold porch flags of many designs. In a sewing magazine article, Jerry called it a blessing. “I have a God-given talent that earns me a living.”

BEAUTIFUL BEAUFORT

Living on the boat was Jerry’s idea. No yardwork, she said. No housework. And being a flight attendant was something she wanted to do since college. She flew with a charter service to London, even living in Miami for a while, and got to work Bob Dole’s barnstorming national 96-hour blitz at the end of his 1996 presidential campaign. Ray enjoyed the trips and layovers in England, staying in fine hotels on an airline’s dime. Jerry said her creative life has been possible because of her husband. She lists things that just might be the secret to long life. She said he is patient, generous, loving, giving – and does most of the cooking.

At 99, Ray can say how glad he is that he met a Beaufort girl. They’ve done a lot here. He was grand marshal of the Veterans Day Parade. She was Queen of Old Commons in an event to raise money for historic preservation, and she organized the Beaufort High School Class of 1954’s 50th reunion.

Ray warns that Beaufort is loved for what Beaufort is, not for the development that is so rampant today. He said developers care about money, not Beaufort.

He says he’s been very lucky in life, right up to the bonus laps he enjoys today. “I can’t understand why I’m still around at 99,” he said. “I’m surprised I’m here...and very thankful for it.”

David Lauderdale may be reached at LauderdaleColumn@gmail.com.