Joseph W. Kaminski, a retired filling station owner and centenarian who until recently was working five days a week as a bindery technician for Baltimore County's public schools, died of heart failure May 7 at Gilchrist Hospice Center. The longtime Rosedale resident was 100.
On hitting the century mark last year, Mr. Kaminski said in an interview with The Catholic Review, "When I reach 125, I'll think about retiring - but not until then."
His daughter, Deborah A. Smith, who lives in Perry Hall, said, "He would have turned 101 next month on June 16."
Mr. Kaminski was born in Baltimore and raised near the old University of Maryland Hospital.
After graduating from Polytechnic Institute in 1926, he worked for several area gas stations before purchasing one in Catonsville in the late 1930s.
With the outbreak of World War II, he was drafted into the Army in 1941, and assigned to the Army Air Forces.
Because of a hearing problem, he was transferred to the Air Force Band, where he played saxophone until receiving a medical discharge in 1943.
After leaving the service, Mr. Kaminski played sax in several Baltimore nightclub bands, when one night, a young woman, Marie C. Lubawski, walked into Bittner's nightclub on Monument Street.
Mr. Kaminski pointed her out to the bandleader and said he was going to marry the "Coca-Cola girl" one day.
"He called her the 'Coca-Cola girl' because that's all she drank," said his daughter, with a laugh. They were married in 1944.
Through the years, Mr. Kaminski owned and operated a Gulf station on Aliceanna Street in Fells Point and later an Exxon station on Potee Street, which he sold in 1980 and retired.
However, he didn't stay retired for long, and almost immediately took a job working four hours a day, five days a week, as a bindery technician at the Baltimore County public schools' copy and print services center in Middle River.
During his workday, Mr. Kaminski cut, folded and helped print and collate printed materials that were used in county offices and schools.
"He was still driving himself to work every day. He loved working," Mrs. Smith said. "The year he turned 100, he won an award for perfect attendance. He also had accumulated a year-and-a-half worth of sick time."
Last year, County Executive James T. Smith Jr. proclaimed his birthday Joseph Kaminski Day in Baltimore County.
Mr. Kaminski gave up working in February because of failing health.
Sitting around had never been an option for Mr. Kaminski, who daily climbed onto his treadmill, peddled an exercise bike and lifted weights in the mini-gym of his Daybreak Terrace home, where he had lived since 1965.
"Keeping busy and productive was his secret for longevity," his daughter said. "He also did everything in moderation and had given up smoking years and years ago."
Also, Mr. Kaminski included a large bowl of oatmeal in his daily diet. He also liked apples and confessed to The Catholic Review that he had a "weakness for sweets," particularly ice cream.
"He said a 'bottle of beer a day from a bottle, and not a can, would prevent Alzheimer's disease,'" his daughter said. Mr. Kaminski also attributed his strong Roman Catholic faith as contributing to his longevity. He was a longtime communicant of the Roman Catholic Church of the Annunciation in Rosedale, where he was an usher and greeter.
A stylish dresser who favored suits, Mr. Kaminski greeted his fellow church-goers with outstretched hands, one of which held a black rosary given him by a priest in the early days of World War II.
After confessing to the priest that he was scared, the priest gave him the rosary that he carried daily for the rest of his life because it gave "me courage," he told The Catholic Review.
A memorial Mass will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday at his church, 5212 McCormick Ave.
In addition to his wife and daughter, Mr. Kaminski is survived by a grandson.
