Edward P. Manhard; Oldest Jesuit at 103

Father Edward P. Manhard, 103, believed to be the oldest Jesuit in the world and the oldest Roman Catholic priest in the United States. Born in 1898, the grandson of Swiss immigrants, Manhard joined the Society of Jesus, or Jesuit Order, in 1919. He earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Saint Louis University in 1925 and a master’s degree a year later. He taught on the Rosebud Sioux Indian Reservation in South Dakota before becoming a Navy chaplain during World War II. He served in the Navy Reserve, leaving in 1955 as a commander. Manhard spent the next two decades teaching religion and Latin at Jesuit high schools in Kansas City, Mo., and Milwaukee. At a nursing home in St. Louis.