92-year-old woman says ‘movement is medicine’

Dottie Connelly exercises with a Fit Forever work-out video Friday, Nov 20, 2009 with other Mount Pleasant Retirement Village members in Monroe, Ohio.

Gary Stelzer/Staff photographer Dottie Connelly exercises with a Fit Forever work-out video Friday, Nov 20, 2009 with other Mount Pleasant Retirement Village members in Monroe, Ohio.

ENLARGE PHOTO

By Denise Wilson, Staff Writer Updated 11:25 AM Monday, November 23, 2009

Ninety-two year old Dottie Connelly says she lives in a retirement home where she sees some of her former students, and loves it.

Before retiring in 1975, Connelly spent 27 of her 36 years teaching physical education to students at Middletown’s Roosevelt Junior High, which later became a middle school.

Connelly took the job — the only job she ever had — upon graduating from Miami University in 1939 with a bachelor of science degree in education.

During her tenure with the school, she said she also served nine years as dean of girls, responsible for discipline and absences for 600 girls at Roosevelt.

Upon her retirement she and her husband, Arthur, who had been operating Woodshed Antiques on Union Road in Middletown, retired to Florida for about 34 years.

When Arthur died, the Chillicothe native returned to the area.

“I was alone for two or three years and I didn’t like it. It didn’t work out. You have friends, but the thing is you won’t cook for yourself,” she said.

So she moved into an independent living building at Mount Pleasant Retirement Village in Monroe.

Today, Connelly, who has previously broken both hips, stays fit by working out three times a week in an exercise class in her building.

“That’s what keeps me going ... the exercises I do here. You have to keep moving. Movement is medicine,” she said.

She said one of her biggest thrills is seeing some of her former students visiting family at Mount Pleasant Place.

In fact, Connelly said she recently ran into one of her former students — Wilma Gade — who also is a resident there.

“When I graduated and had my first class, she was in it. See I remembered her name after all those years,” she said.

“I hadn’t been here too long when she move in on the first floor. I kept passing when her name was on the door. When I went by one day and she was moving in and I went up to the door and said, ‘Wilma,’ she came.”

Gade said it was such a pleasant surprise to see her former teacher the first day she moved in to Mount Pleasant Place.

“Of course we’ve visited since and shared experiences and asked about mutual friends, and just have become reacquainted. It’s been a nice experience for me and I hope for her,” she said.

Gade, 84, said Connelly has not changed a bit.

“She’s still a teacher. Once a teacher, always a teacher. She’s always teaching or helping someone. I’d say she’s very much the same,” said Gade — who also participates in the same exercise class.

Share this article