97-Year-Old Reaps Food Bank Harvest

John Zauner spent his childhood gleaning the fields in his homeland of Austria every weekend.

Today, the 97-year-old Ojai resident is one of the longest-serving gleaners with Food Share, Ventura County’s food bank.

“My father and mother would gather us together and we would travel out of town where the fields were and glean,” said Zauner, who has gathered surplus fruits and vegetables locally since 1976. “When I was a kid I hated it and now I love it.”

More than 40 volunteers gathered Wednesday morning for a surprise party for Zauner’s birthday before they gleaned winter squash for the poor.

“What a wonderful surprise this is,” said Zauner, who has lived in Ojai since 1966.

“I wake up every morning at 4 a.m., have breakfast at 4:30 a.m. and . . . go out gleaning at 7 a.m. I usually call in to the food bank the evening before to find out what we’ll be picking the next morning.”

“A lot of our older volunteers, like John, lived through the Depression and want to help others in some way,” said Jim Mangis, executive director of Food Share.

“They knew what it was like in the 1930s and want to give something back.”

Bob Unruhe, captain of the 11-member gleaning team in Ojai, led the celebration.

Zauner gleans five times a week. “That’s what keeps him alive,” Unruhe said. “It gives him purpose. He has amazing health. John just . . . bought himself a new car.”

Teams from Ventura, Camarillo, Ojai, Oxnard, Santa Paula and Thousand Oaks glean the harvest every morning--and Zauner is among the top gleaners, Unruhe said.

The teams glean on farms countywide, with the work sites dependent upon which crop is in season.

“Our teams come together for one big pick and it’s very effective,” Unruhe said.

“If anyone thinks they can out-glean John, they’re mistaken. He is very fast. John outworks all of us. He’s just a remarkable guy.”

Zauner owned a hair salon on New York’s Fifth Avenue for 10 years with Frances, his wife of 66 years. Frances died in 1992.

When they moved to California, they worked in salons along Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles for 20 years before retiring to Ojai in 1966.