We first introduced you to Bob Vollmer, the oldest state employee in Indiana history, when he was just 98.
He has since turned 100, and it was a birthday celebration to remember.
You can call Vollmer an Indiana legend. He started at Indiana’s Department of Natural Resources when JFK was inaugurated, quite an accomplishment on it's own.
Now you can add another milestone: turning 100 years old.
"Boy time really flies,” Vollmer said to a crowd at his birthday reception. “I didn't expect all this.”
Vollmer still works in the field, surveying the state four days a week.
He was recently honored by the governor with a Sagamore of the Wabash, but something tells me this meant more: a birthday card received from an Indiana third grader.
"He said ‘I am going to write 100 a hundred times’ and he did,” Vollmer told the crowd. “100, 100, 100… I counted them. There are a hundred."
We asked what it meant to him to have such a crowd at his celebration.
“It means I must have done something right."
He has, and that is why the DNR will be dedicating a plaque in his name in Brown County State Park.
"To your dedication and your age, we will have a permanent sign for the 10 line at Brown County State Park," DNR’s Dale Gick announced.
"How about that," Vollmer said.
"Before we cut the cake I think I can speak for everyone in this room, it has been an honor to work with you,” said DNR director Cameron Clark. “We should be thanking you for your wisdom, dedication, wit and your stories. Thank you."
Like the story about when he took his mother out for a beer when she turned a hundred.
"I got up in front of everybody and I said today this lady is a hundred years old. I thought she was going to hit me. She didn't want anyone to know she was 100 but there is nothing wrong with it. Everybody knows you are a hundred. They do now,” Vollmer said.
And everyone has questions.
"One of my great-great-grandsons asked me if I knew Adam and Eve,” Vollmer said, laughing.
"Sometimes I get, especially hearing all the news about the bad things going on in the world and there are some bad things, but when you look at these kids coming up. Hell we ain't got nothing to worry about. They are pretty sharp."
And so is he, which is why he was celebrated with song. But all of this begs the question: how much longer will he work? He answered with a baseball analogy.
"I believe in taking a cut at it, all the way to the end. You go down swinging,” Vollmer said.
By the way, Vollmer’s mom lived to be 108.
That plaque honoring Bob Vollmer is expected to be dedicated later this year.
