Elaine LaLanne flexing her muscles is about to turn 100-years old on March 19. Submitted photo
Morro Bay’s most famous citizen is about to celebrate a milestone few people reach and perhaps fittingly, she’ll do it after being inducted into another Hall of Fame.
Elaine LaLanne, widow of the late fitness guru and world-famous health and fitness entrepreneur, Jack LaLanne will turn 100 on March 19, just days after she and Jack are inducted into the Health And Fitness Association Hall of Fame at a special ceremony set for March 15 in San Diego. In 2017, she was inducted into the National Fitness Hall of Fame.
“Elaine LaLanne is a true trailblazer,” wrote Liz Clark, President and CEO of the Health & Fitness Association, “whose influence spans generations. Her lifelong dedication to exercise, nutrition, and helping others live healthier lives has left an indelible mark on our industry.
At nearly 100-years young, Elaine is quite simply the most youthful 99-year-old I have ever met, and she personally inspires me — not only to keep moving my body, but to make every moment count. Honoring Elaine while celebrating her 100th birthday is a rare and meaningful moment for the entire health and fitness community.”
Submitted photo
Elaine recently took time from what continues to be a busy schedule to reflect on her life with Estero Bay News.
She was born Elaine Doyle, March 19, 1926, in Fairview Hospital in Minneapolis, Minn., she said over a Zoom call. Though born in the city, she recalls that she spent a lot of time with relatives on their farm in Iowa including summers.
The farm was in Roland, Iowa, she says, a town of just 500 people. “I think it’s still 500,” she laughs. They did finally get a freeway though.
She spent much of her early days playing baseball. A catcher, she recounts times when batters threw their bats, hitting her in the face a few times.
“I had my tooth knocked out by a thrown bat,” she says. Back in those days dentistry wasn’t like today. She says she had to have a gold band inserted in her mouth. She also got hit more than once in her left eye, damaging it for life. Baseball was a tough sport.
Nevertheless, “I loved baseball,” she says. She also loved swimming.
She performed with the Minneapolis Aqua Follies, swimming in a one-piece suit. Several of the photos given to EBN for this story show the youthful Elaine in her swimsuit, photographed in the way glamorous movie stars of the day posed.
She was with the Follies in 1945 when she came out to California to visit relatives. This was after her boyfriend was killed in the Battle of Iwo Jima during World War II, she says.
Her cousins were working in the shipyards, she recalls, helping build the craft that won the war.
“I stayed” in California, she says. She got into radio during its early days at the NBC Radio Institute. “I went into radio,” she recalls, “way before television.” She had moved to San Francisco when TV came to Los Angeles. She used to visit L.A. a lot and was working in San Francisco demonstrating 45-RPM record players at The Emporium store, when her life’s direction changed.
“A woman asked me if she could get Bing Crosby on a 45,” Elaine says. “I said ‘No, but you can get Perry Cuomo. He sounds just like him.’”
A popular local disc jockey was starting a new TV morning talk show on station KGO, an ABC affiliate in San Francisco, in 1948. “He needed someone to book guests,” she recalls, “and to appear as his ‘Girl Friday,’ today that’s a co-host.”
Early on she was told about a man from Oakland who said he would come on the show and do push-ups for the entire broadcast. “It was an hour and a half show,” she says. They used a radio orchestra for the show at the time.
“So I put this guy on — it was Jack LaLanne, and he did push-ups through the whole 90-minute show.”
“I didn’t see him again until 1951,” she says. This was after they’d moved the TV show to a proper studio. Their show was on from 4:30 to 6, she says, and Jack’s show came on at 9. She got the health and fitness talk right away.
“He would see me smoking cigarettes, eating bear claws and donuts,” she says. “He’d tell me, ‘You should eat apples.”
She recalls Jack bringing a guy on who’d lost 50 pounds and told him he’d take 30 pounds off him in 30 days. And he did it too.
He also showed her pictures of lungs blackened by smoking, comparing them to healthy pink lungs. “I thought, ‘Oh God, I’m going to have black lungs,’” she says.
So she changed her ways — stopped eating candy bars for lunch and quit smoking. She took up Jack’s philosophy. “He’d say ‘If you do everything in moderation, you can’t go wrong.’” It’s something she still lives by.
They married in 1959 and she became not just an integral part of his morning exercise show, but a partner in their various ventures, from establishing the first membership fitness centers to the famous infomercials selling the Jack LaLanne Power and Fusion Juicer. She’s appeared in countless TV shows as a guest and fitness expert. Among the shows are The Today Show, The Early Show, Friends, Fox and Friends and Howard Stern.
She’s authored seven books on the subject, too, specifically for older people helping them get and stay fit. All of her books, as well as the numerous books bearing Jack’s authorship, are available on Amazon.
Among her books is Dynastride! A Complete Walking Program for Fitness after 50.
“I wrote five books in the 1980s,” she says. “And three books since the early ‘90s.”
There’s a new one coming out soon exploring “legacies,” telling the stories of women authors including herself. “Everybody has a legacy,” she says. “I never thought I had a legacy. I had no idea what would happen when I went in with Jack.”
Reflecting, she says the best thing about turning 100 is her attitude. “A positive attitude about everything,” she explains. “It’s not easy being 100-years old. You have to accept and persevere. Once you accept what is, you have to persevere.”
“A lot of people have problems,” she continues. “You can get through it if you accept and persevere. That’s been my philosophy the past 100 years — be positive. Too many people give up.”
The worst thing about turning 100 for her is physical. “I made the wrong decision,” she says, “I should have had a new knee put in but I was too busy writing books. I said, ‘I’ll do it later.’ now my knee is giving me fits. But I accept it. I made the wrong decision.”
After she and Jack’s Hall of Fame induction, the Association plans to throw her a grand 100th birthday bash that will include many of the leading fitness advocates of today. Then on March 21 she’s planning a local birthday party with friends at her home in Morro Bay.
In the end, she lives the message of some of her books, “If you want to live — get moveing!”
