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Milton Ashley still going strong, approaching 100

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Contributed by: Mark Kellam on 7/17/2008

I'm as amazed as anyone," said Milton Ashley, referring to how spry he is as he approaches his 100th birthday.

He has no plans to slow down anytime soon. In fact, he was recently named Volunteer of the Year at West Hills Hospital and Medical Center, where he helps four days a week transporting medicine to nursing stations, running errands and escorting patients as they leave the hospital.

"He has such a youthful spirit and so much enthusiasm," said Carrie Brazil, director of volunteer services at the hospital. "For someone his age, you wouldn't expect that."

Milton, who lives in Hidden Hills, has been a volunteer for four years at the hospital, where he's known as "Milty." This past year, he volunteered 1,600 hours.

"I just ran out of things to do," he said of his interest in starting volunteer work.

When he and his late wife, Martha, moved to the San Fernando Valley in the late 1940s, it was a very different place. When they lived in Canoga Park, it was called Owensmouth. When he lived in Woodland Hills, it was called Jirard.
And when you drove down Ventura Boulevard, heading westward, "all you saw was orange grove after orange grove after orange grove," Milton recalled.

He was a land developer and built houses throughout the Valley. A few years after Milton retired in 1970, he and Martha sold their home and took to the road, living in their RVs - they had four of them.

They traveled to every state in the country - some several times - for more than 20 years. They visited every state in Mexico and province in Canada, too.

"We spent 15 winters in Guadalajara, Mexico," he said.

But their travels included jaunts across the Atlantic, as well.

"In 1964, I bought a Porsche in Reseda and took delivery of it in Stuttgart, Germany," Milton said.

However, when he and Martha arrived, the car wasn't ready because of a labor strike. So they went to Italy for a week.

When they returned to Stuttgart, the car still wasn't ready. They showed him some floor models and he fell in love with a ruby red Porsche with black interior.

"I said, 'That one's mine,'" Milton said with a chuckle. "We drove all over Europe for six months."

They then had the car shipped back to New York, where they jumped in it for a cross-country journey back to L.A.

Surprisingly agile, sharp as a tack, and with good eyesight and his own teeth, Milton said he's not sure what's helped lead him toward the century mark on Nov. 16.

"I eat things just like everyone else," he said. "It must be the genes."

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