Chitetsu Watanabe

Chitetsu Watanabe (渡邉智哲; Watanabe Chitetsu, 5 March 1907 – 23 February 2020) was a Japanese farmer and supercentenarian.

Chitetsu Watanabe (before 1945)

Born on 5 March 1907 in the village of Uragawara, which now is Joetsu, in Niigata Prefecture, Japan to farmers, Watanabe studied at Niigata Prefectural Takada Agricultural High School before moving to Taiwan where he lived and worked for the sugarcane company Dai-Nippon Sugar Company though until the end of World War II when he returned to Jōetsu. He lived with his son's family until 2015 when he aged 108 got infected by influenza and moved to a retirement home. He had in total 5 children, 12 grandchildren, 16 great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild, who was born on 15 January 2019, just five days before 113-year-old Hokkaido man Masazō Nonaka's death, upon which Watanabe became the oldest living man, although German World War II-veteran Gustav Gerneth (15 October 1905? – 22 October 2019) and Mexican Domingo Villa Avisencio (26 August 1906? – 3 November 2019) claimed to be older. He was officially recognized by Guinness World Records as the oldest living man on 12 February 2020, and believed the secret to a long life was laughing often, forgetting bad things and avoiding to get angry, and said on his 112th birthday in early March 2019 that he wanted to try his best to eat delicious healthy food until age 120 and might eat his own food except hard food and liked sweet food.

Watanabe died 11:10 p.m. the late evening of 23 February 2020, just eleven days before his 113th birthday, and was succeeded as the oldest living man by Englishman Robert Weighton.

Chitetsu Watanabe Media

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  Fusa Tatsumi, c. 1920s

References

Preceded by Masazō Nonaka	Oldest living man 20 January 2019 – 23 February 2020	Succeeded by Robert Weighton
Preceded by Masazō Nonaka	Japan's oldest living man 20 January 2019 – 23 February 2020	Succeeded by Issaku Tomoe