Eighty and energized

By Staff
Jonathan Willis FCT Staff Writer
Thirty-two years ago, Evelyn Martin was told that she may be destined for a wheelchair.
Instead, she is celebrating her 80th birthday today doing exactly what she always does: planning to teach her aerobics class.
Martin started taking aerobics classes and exercising when she began to have what was thought to be leg problems. After undergoing tests, she learned that the sciatic nerve in her back was causing the problems.
Martin began teaching the aerobics class for Senior Friends at the Russellville Park and Recreation Center thirteen years ago and credits that to her sustained good health. The Senior Friends class meets four times a week and you must be at least 50 years old to participate.
Martin has fought and won two bouts with cancer since 1996. The second cancer required her to undergo 11 rounds of Interluken II treatments which were experimental for her type of cancer.
She has now been in complete remission for more than seven years and is only looking ahead.
She believes that the aerobics classes that she takes three days a week were instrumental in overcoming her fight with cancer.
Now retired and an avid gardener and collector of 1920s jazz and blues records, Martin said that she scoffs at the idea that people over 50 can't take part in her aerobics classes.