90-year-old medals at Bloomsday

Lucille Hammer, 90, of Kalispell, got a surprise recently when she received a first-place medal from the annual Lilac Bloomsday Run held May 6 in Spokane.

“I beat all those in my age group,” she said.

Although only three entered in the 90 age division, Hammer was proud to finish in the top spot. Her time was just over three hours, walking with her daughter, Arnette Daniels, and other family members.

“It’s seven and a half miles,” she said. “Of course we don’t race; we walk.”

This year marked the fourth or fifth time that she has taken part in the popular event that includes serious competitive racers along with pleasure walkers such as herself, her daughter, her grandson Chad Oakland, his wife Niki and their children, Brady, 5, and Cooper, 4.

“We go just for the fun of it,” Hammer said.

Hammer couldn’t recall how they got started entering Bloomsday, but her daughter told her it was after she finished radiation for breast cancer about 12 years ago. It predated the passing of her husband, Howard, in 2001 and marked the end of her treatment for her second occurrence of breast cancer.

“That was the last time, so I think I’m through,” she said with a smile.

A Montana native raised on a farm in Hogeland near the Canadian border, Hammer said she and another woman had a beauty shop there, which they sold in the ’40s. She then purchased Marie’s Beauty Shop in Kalispell.

“It was upstairs in the Whipps Building for years,” she said. “I sold it when I started having kids.”

She married Howard, a real estate and insurance man, in 1946. The couple had Arnette and Howard Jr.

According to Hammer, she has enjoyed being active all of her life. She used to walk every morning as a ritual.

“I’d get up every morning and do that,” she said. “Howard would have the coffee ready when I got home. I don’t do that now.”

She does walk on most days. Hammer said she strolls down to stores and down and around the mall.

“I like to walk, so I walk whenever I can,” she said. “Someone said, you never take your car. I do when I get groceries.”

She also goes to the exercise class at the senior center three times a week just to get out and about. Hammer performs all the yard work at her tidy and well-kept house, as well.

“I’d rather mow the lawn than vacuum,” she said.

Hammer wasn’t certain whether this marked the fourth or fifth time that she and her daughter took part in Bloomsday, because they have participated some years and not others since first entering more than a decade ago. They didn’t walk last year because her daughter had just gotten a hip replacement.

It was Arnette’s idea to jump in again this year.

“She said, ‘I’ve had my hip replacement for a year, and you’re 90. Let’s do it,’” Hammer recalled.

The two didn’t do a lot of training in advance of Bloomsday. Hammer went to her daughter’s home in Otis Orchards, Wash., about a week before the Spokane event, where they walked a little each day.

“We went about a mile or two every day to make sure we were walking,” she said.

With just under 48,000 people taking part in the popular event, Hammer and her extended family joined a throng of people in downtown Spokane on May 6. She wore no special clothes — just comfortable walking shoes, slacks and a sweater during the cool spring morning hours.

Bloomsday officials dispatch groups based on their pace, with the competitive runners leaving first.

“They finish before we hardly get started,” Hammer said with a laugh. “I think we’re some of the slowest ones.”

When they heard their group called to start, Hammer and her family took off at a comfortable pace. She said she enjoyed talking to the family while walking and watching her great-grandchildren bound along with youthful energy.

Race volunteers handed them bottled water, and others sent out sprays of water for those who needed to cool off. She said the toughest part of the race is “Doomsday Hill,” which comes up after walking for quite a while.

“You’re at the bottom and you’re tired, and you look up there and you think, ‘I’ll never, never make it up that hill,’” Hammer said. “Then you are always relieved when you get to the top of it.”

 She was tired but feeling a sense of accomplishment at the end of Bloomsday. Her statistics sheet reported that she finished number 46,687 out of 47,841.

“We’re not racing or trying to beat anyone,” she said. “It’s fun when you get through and you think, ‘Boy, I’ve made it.’”

Reporter Candace Chase may be reached at 758-4436 or by email at cchase@dailyinterlake.com.