Pearl's resident veteran and centenarian

Colin Heard is the oldest surviving veteran in the Northern Territory and now a centenarian.

He lives in Pearl Supported Care and has been part of the community for about seven years, since moving into Pearl Retirement Resort with his late wife.

Born in Adelaide in 1924, Mr Heard joined the airforce as a young man during World War II.

At the time he was living in Naracoorte and joined up to the airforce with three other young men from the town around the same time as the Battle of the Coral Sea in 1942.

“It was a pivotal day and I remember the wireless said ‘America has won the war’,” Mr Heard remembered.

He flew a Kittyhawk fighter plane while the Allied and American forces followed the retreating Japanese forces through the Philippines.

“It was just a matter of turning up behind the lines and that’s all we did,” he said.

Although Mr Heard feels he was not involved in many active battles during his service, his peers from Naracoorte did not return home from the war.

On his return from service, Mr Heard took up a job in retail again and became involved in the Naracoorte community.

“My first achievement was I instigated a swimming pool in Naracoorte, I was very proud of the fact that I was the Chairman of that committee,” he said.

“The swimming pool was half an acre of water, built by a man that couldn’t read or write - he lived way out in the bush behind Lucindale and it took 16 weeks.

“It was a wonderful achievement.”

The Naracoorte Swimming Lake was opened in 1961, after three years of planning and fundraising by the volunteer committee, and is still in use today.

Mr Heard also met his wife in Naracoorte, they had three children and eventually moved to Melbourne.

“My wife said to me, ‘you’re bored’, so she came with me on a trip to Melbourne and we finished up opening retail stores in six different places,” explained Mr Heard.

The couple worked hard in their stores for a time until they were bought out by a large chain, and then they travelled across Australia and the world.

About seven years ago, Mr Heard and his wife settled in Darwin, where their son is a doctor, and moved into the Pearl Retirement Resort.

Mr Heard recently celebrated his 100th birthday with his family.

“That was a wonderful experience - they were all healthy and well, all my sons, grandsons, great grandchildren,” he said.

“I’m a very lucky boy, I was born lucky.”