1594: Longevity Lessons from a 100-Year-Old Colonel with Charles Cone

Friday, June 19, 2026

Born in a farmhouse with no electricity, losing his mother at birth, and growing up in a one-room schoolhouse with torn dictionaries, Colonel Charles Cone had every reason to believe life would keep him small. Instead, he spent 30 years in the U.S. military, became a Navy and then Air Force pilot, flew in three wars, earned the first computer science degree ever awarded at Texas A&M, and is still flying and working out with a trainer at 100 years old. In this episode, Charles shares the remarkable journey behind his autobiography, A Burning Desire to Fly, and how a “dumb farm kid” with hay fever, no role models, and almost no resources built a life of service, courage, and quiet excellence.

We explore the defining moments that shaped him: the psychologist who wrote “a burning desire to fly” on his file and unintentionally gave him a lifelong mantra; being assigned to a plane he didn’t want, deciding to excel anyway, and becoming the youngest patrol plane commander in the Pacific; surviving a harrowing typhoon flight with almost no fuel and no navigation; and the day his crew including his roommate died in a crash on the very day he was to leave the Navy, a tragedy that led, through another twist of fate, to meeting his future wife. Charles reflects on living through World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the entire arc of aviation and computing from punch cards and 1K memory to smartwatches and self-flying aircraft while holding onto simple, old-school values of duty, faith, and persistence.

Charles also shares the “unflashy” secrets behind his longevity and impact: decades of disciplined physical fitness, continuing to learn and contribute long after retirement, saying yes to service (from Lions Club projects to flying mercy missions), and treating every assignment even the ones he didn’t want as worth doing to the best of his ability. If you’re feeling stuck, discouraged, or tempted to coast into later life, this conversation is a living rebuttal: a 100-year case study in why you don’t quit, why you keep your body and mind engaged, and why, as Charles sums it up in his favorite quote and life lesson, you “never give up.”

Quotes:

"I’m just an ordinary old jerk, and it’s kind of surprising to me when I wake up now and then and say, ‘Well, you’re what they call an author,’ and you’re not really an author, you’re just a plain old guy."

"I guess I realized that my persistence had gotten me a long way; there was that sort of thing of not giving up. Don’t give up, and I still say that today."

"All of us get discouraged at one time or another in some circumstance, and if you can just sit back and get rid of that discouragement and say, ‘Well, let’s get on with it, let’s do what needs to be done,’ if it means quitting and changing, change, but don’t just fret about it."