The country’s oldest veteran, 112-year-old Richard Overton, has died following a bout with pneumonia, according to reports.
Overton was admitted to a local hospital in mid-December and was diagnosed with pneumonia. It was his third bout with pneumonia in recent years, according to the local Fox News affiliate.
The nationally known veteran died Thursday at a rehab facility in Austin, the same outlet reported late Thursday.
Overton was born in 1906 in Bastrop, Texas, a small rural town located 25 miles east of Austin.
He served three years in the Army during World War II.
After the war, he returned to Austin. In 1945, he built a home on the east side of town, where he lived for the rest of his life.
Last year, the Austin City Council added an honorary name to the street he has lived on for more than seven decades: Richard Overton Avenue.
Overton was honored by former President Barack Obama in Washington in 2013. Obama praised him for going to war for his country even though as an African-American, he did not have the same rights as others in the country.
“His service on the battlefield was not always matched by the respect that he deserved at home. But this veteran held his head high,” Obama said in the Veterans Day tribute.
Energy Secretary Rick Perry, the former governor of Texas, once visited Overton on the front porch of his Austin home in May 2013. Overton was known for enjoying the outdoor extension of his home and sitting there for hours each day.
He thanked God in interviews for letting him live such a long life and joked that his guilty pleasures — cigars and whiskey — also helped him achieve longevity.
“I been smoking cigars from when I was 18 years old, I’m still a smoking ‘em. 12 a day,” Overton said.
Overton’s health declined in 2016 and his family was forced to look at placing him in a facility where he could have round-the-clock care.
The news got out and people donated to a crowdfunding effort that ended up raising $450,000 so that Overton could stay in his house and have a nurse on site all hours of the day.
