Centenarians gather at North Valley Senior Center for food, music and festivity on the year's 100th day

Normally, April 10 would mark the 100th day of the year — except in the cases of leap years, like 2024.

In honor of reaching the century mark for the year, this time on April 9, the city of Albuquerque’s Department of Senior Affairs partnered with students from Valley High School to host the second annual Centennial Birthday Celebration at the North Valley Senior Center on Tuesday.

“It’s a very special opportunity to celebrate folks that have these wonderful lived experiences and highlight them as important, valued community members,” said Anna Sanchez, the director of the Department of Senior Affairs.

The chance to celebrate their community is the exact reason why students from Valley’s student senate and extracurricular organization, Valley Academy, decided to get involved in this celebration.

“We wanted to do something fun and support our community in a way that wasn’t completely connected to Valley, so we got in contact with the center,” Lillian Lucero, a junior and member of Valley Academy, said.

Students brought table cloths, bought food and table toppers, and helped set up the party room ahead of the celebration.

The celebration featured live music, dancing and food and honored three members of the North Valley Senior Center community who turned 100 this year: Kathrine Dolce, 100; Lydia Murphy, 102; and John Perovich, 100.

You can’t stop Kathrine Dolce; you can only hope to contain her. The only thing the former computer programmer from Sandia National Laboratories has not done in retirement is stop moving. But for a moment on Tuesday, she had a pretty good reason to sit still.

Sitting near the dance floor and wearing a white and gold sash that read “100 years loved,” Dolce was all smiles as senior center staff members and other seniors greeted her and congratulated her on achieving the century milestone.

When asked what the key to her longevity was, Kay credited her active lifestyle.

“I’ve been a hiker. I’ve hiked all the trails in the Sandia and Manzano mountains, and once a week, I go up the La Luz Trail, all the way to the top,” she said.

In addition to hiking, Dolce also began playing senior women’s basketball for a local team in Albuquerque in her 90s. A point guard, she developed an effective “jump” shot” but has since given up the game due to a shoulder injury. In its place, Dolce has taken up shuffleboard in the city’s Sports and Fitness Program.

Sitting just a couple tables over from Dolce was Lydia Murphy. A member of the North Valley Share Your Care program, she spent the afternoon sitting amongst friends, taking in the scenes and singing along to the live music.

While Dolce and Murphy were seated front and center, John Perovich preferred the back of the room. He had arrived to celebrate a bit late, but for good reason — he was finishing up his lunch at another senior center.

When you’ve lived a long and well-traveled life as Perovich has, it makes sense why he’s not in a hurry anymore. The son of a coal miner, he grew up in a miners’ camp 12 miles from Raton. He attended grade school at the camp, and when the time came for him to go to high school, he rode the school bus into Raton.

After he graduated from Raton High School in 1942, Perovich was drafted into the U.S. Army Air Corps. Serving as a navigator during World War II, he traveled the world over, ferrying military aircraft.

“The Pacific, the Atlantic, from England to Hawaii, I picked up airplanes and was never any place for very long,” he said.

After he left the service in 1945, Perovich returned to the state and attended the University of New Mexico, where he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in business administration in 1948 and 1949.

Perovich later worked for the University of New Mexico in several roles, including purchasing agent, comptroller and vice president for the university’s business and finance division.

In 1982, Perovich became the 12th president of the University of New Mexico. He served in the role until 1984, and when asked what the role meant to him, he responded by saying, “it was just a job.” Regardless of his accomplishments or titles, he will always be a coal miner’s son at heart.