Jan. 18, 2021

Gordon Carlson has seen vaccines come a long way in his 100 years.

The Sioux Falls man remembers getting the smallpox vaccine as a teen in the 1930s. A decade later, polio hit his Minnesota community, and it wasn’t until 1955 when Jonas Salk invented a vaccine to inoculate against it.

On Monday, less than a year after COVID-19 made its way to the United States, Carlson was among the first residents in the assisted living apartments at The Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society’s Prairie Creek to receive the coronavirus vaccine.

“This is a great day,” Carlson said, his sleeve rolled up, ready to get the shot. “I’ve been waiting for this for many months.”

Video courtesy of The Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society.

The staff at Prairie Creek have already been vaccinated, and the goal is to have all residents vaccinated at all Good Samaritan assisted living centers by mid-February, according to spokesman Shawn Neistadt.

Call it a belated birthday gift for the widower, who marked his 100th birthday in December.

The vaccine means he’s one step closer to seeing his family again, to sitting close to friends at dinner again and to playing his regular games of King’s Cup with fellow Good Samaritan residents again.

“Smallpox is eradicated,” Carlson said. “Polio is under control. The object now is getting vaccinated (against COVID-19). … I have great confidence and belief in the vaccine and that it’s necessary.”

Carlson was born in 1920 in Anoka County, Minn. He first came to Sioux Falls in 1944 to work for a dairy farmer, and soon after, he joined the Army.

It sent him to Japan, where he fought in World War II.

This is the ship that brought him home in 1946.

“We encountered a storm on the way home, so we had to detour up through the Aleutian Islands then back to San Francisco,” he wrote in a digital file where he saved photos from the time. “We were so seasick that we thought we might die, but after being sick for so long, we were afraid we wouldn’t die.”

But he made it back to his hometown in Minnesota, where life sounded only slightly better.

“I had no car, no girlfriend. “I said, ‘This is for the dogs,’ so I came back to South Dakota.”

Sioux Falls is where he met his wife of 69 years and where the couple raised six children together.

One of those children, a daughter, still lives in the area, and she has been able to visit Carlson through a glass wall in the vestibule of Prairie Creek.

For the rest of the family, he has embraced Zoom calls.

Even with 100 years of perspective, Carlson said the coronavirus pandemic has been terrible.

“It’s scary, and it’s dangerous,” he said. “We just have to pray that we are fortunate enough to be spared it.”

He thinks of all the families who are grieving over lost mothers, fathers and children who died from COVID-19.

He’s also grateful for riding out the pandemic at a Good Samaritan facility, where he has received care from people like Alecia O’Neill, the senior living administrator.

Staff members said his zest for life hasn’t diminished, as he has passed the pandemic with audio books and as he “Googles anything he’s curious about.”

O’Neill was the first Good Samaritan staff member to receive the coronavirus vaccine and as of earlier this month has received both shots.

Having a vaccine available has created a tangible shift in morale at the long-term care facility, O’Neill said. While Carlson kept high spirits throughout, O’Neill said the pandemic has created some long days and some feelings of hopelessness.

Now, the mood is lifting.

“There’s definitely more of a sense of ‘we can get through this,’ a sense of hope, a little more joy to keep us going through the months ahead,” O’Neill said.

Carlson, too, has felt his mood shift. He said it was a great day when the Food and Drug Administration approved the first vaccine option from Pfizer, followed by one from Moderna days later.

“That changed the picture entirely,” Carlson said. “We’re looking forward to when the entire nation can be vaccinated and have this epidemic under control. I’m willing to do my part.”