SENIORS : Living to Work : ‘Try to do something all the time . . . To be resting quietly is not very healthy.’

At age 82 Horacio Martinez has pursued an office affair for the past 77 years. But his bride of 53 years doesn’t mind his passion.

It’s a special love story--a tale of a man’s loyalty and love for his work and three generations of employers.

“My work,” Martinez said “is my hobby, it is my lifelong interest.”

For over three-quarters of a century, Martinez has been an honored employee of the Lozano family, owners of La Opinion, the oldest daily Spanish language newspaper in the country.

These days, Editor-in-Chief Ignacio E. Lozano Jr. sends a chauffeured car twice a week to bring Martinez from his home in Thousand Oaks to La Opinion’s editorial offices in downtown Los Angeles. Although semi-retired since suffering a heart attack about four years ago, Martinez still signs checks and performs some duties of general manager, a position he held for many years.

“ Es un roble-- he’s an oak. Before his illness, he used to arrive here every day at 3 or 4 in the morning,” said Gerardo Lopez, La Opinion’s managing editor.

“He’s the best human relations man we could have inside the company. He’s a caring person who knows just about every one of our 400 employees, and he goes out of his way to encourage them as if they are doing a personal favor for him.”

Martinez’s relationship with the Lozano family began in 1913, when his parents fled the Mexican revolution with their four children to operate a fabric store in Eagle Pass, Tex. His father received the Lozano family’s first newspaper, La Prensa, which 5-year-old Horacio sold.

Later, the family returned to Mexico where Horacio’s mother tutored him, particularly in math. He completed the fourth through sixth grades in Monterrey, and his father placed him in a business school for two years where he studied typing, shorthand and bookkeeping. He completed his studies at age 15 and worked part time in a wholesale grain business while continuing to sell La Prensa, which was shipped across the border from the United States.

In 1926, his father arranged for him to work in La Prensa’s bookstore in San Antonio.

That same year Ignacio E. Lozano founded La Opinion in Los Angeles. A year later, at age 18, Martinez became Lozano’s private secretary and continued to run the bookstore. After Lozano’s death, the family sold La Prensa and in 1959, Lozano’s widow invited Martinez to manage the bookstore that La Opinion operated in Los Angeles. Ignacio E. Lozano Jr. took charge of the newspaper and appointed Martinez general manager.

When Martinez joined La Opinion, it was a small company of about 40 employees, Lopez said. “He was a one-man show--totally in charge. He purchased newsprint, did payroll, paid the bills, handled the bank accounts. Now we have entire departments for production, accounts payable and accounting to do what he did as general manager.

“On Mondays, to prepare the payroll, he’d arrive at 1 or 2 in the morning. After the illness, he delegated most of the work.”

Lopez recalled the Sunday that he was notified that Martinez was in the hospital, having suffered a heart attack.

“I found him in a robe with oxygen tubes on his face. He was sitting right there on the edge of the bed with time cards, writing and getting everything ready for the payroll. When I chided him about doing that, he just looked at his pencil and asked, ‘do you have a pencil sharpener?’ ” Lopez said the doctor permitted Martinez to finish to keep him calm. “He’s so loyal, so dedicated that he forgot about himself.”

For the last few years, Martinez and his wife, Pola, have lived next door to their daughter, where they can enjoy daily contact with some of their seven grandchildren and great-grandchild.

“Even though Lito loves to work, he always finds time for his grandchildren. If we asked him to do something with us, he dropped everything and would go to the park,” said Eric DeWames, 16, of his “abuelito” or grandpa.

“My father always says, ‘If anything happens to me while I’m working, don’t be sad. I’m going like I want to,’ ” said his daughter, Oralia DeWames. “Work,” she said, “is like a source of life for him.”

Martinez likes to dance, work in the garden and read history books. He advises, “Try to do something all the time. Be occupied with manual labor at home and maintain a daily challenge with life. To be resting quietly is not very healthy.”