Ne'er too late: 95 year old votes for first time

(Photo by Michael Fischer) Marion Eleanor Peters of Webb stands in front of the Clay County Administration offices where her city election vote was counted Tuesday night. She is seen holding her State of Iowa Election Day Registration Form. The document allowed the 95-year-old to participate in an election for the first time in her life.

"You've never voted?" her daughter-in-law, Betty Peters asked. The same question came from Darlene Enderton, the chairwoman of the city of Webb's voting precinct.

Even her son, Chuck Peters, didn't realize it. "Yep, I've never voted," she told him.

And, she turns 96 next month.

"It just blew my mind," Chuck Peters said. "She never says much about anything. She still lives alone, she's still got a driver's license."

But, not a voter registration card.

"I told them I had a fishing license if that would help me any," Marion recalls saying to the precinct workers.

Bill, Marion's late husband, never voted either. Marion's parents didn't vote, to the best of her knowledge. She doesn't think her in-laws voted, either.

In several of the smaller, area towns, no one meets the filing deadline -- candidates for mayor and city council are decided by write-in on Election Day.

That wasn't the case on the 2009 Webb ballot, where three candidates met the deadline for three spots on city council and voters could weigh in on a contested mayor's race. Marion's son expected the results to be close.

"Mother, you live in town, you need to vote," Chuck told her. "I don't care who you vote for, but you just need to vote."

Politics and Marion managed to avoid each other even though she has lived for three decades in a house less than three blocks from the Webb Community Center -- the small town's only voting location.

In her eyes, the candidates for larger offices didn't always warrant the trip.

"I always figure it's just the rich that get in there," Marion explained. "If they would put somebody in that was poor and really needed, I would vote for them."

Plus, "when they do get a good one in, they get shot," Marion said. She was getting school lunch ready for students in nearby Gillett Grove when a school janitor walked into the room and told her John F. Kennedy had been assassinated.

She's not that enamored with modern rhetoric either, saying: "All they ever do is knock each other anyway. One will talk against the other one and I don't believe in that."

Even in the days leading up to Tuesday, Marion felt her one vote wouldn't make a difference, but, as her son and daughter-in-law told her, that's not necessarily the case for a city election in Webb, population 151.

Ultimately, eight votes separated incumbent mayor Ken Essick and his successful challenger, Mindy Sylvester on Tuesday night. The contest drew 63 of Webb's 119 registered voters.

And, while she's tuned out the noise of national and state politics, picking a local favorite isn't difficult. Marion knew all of the candidates personally.

"Everybody knows everybody in town," Chuck said.

Her vote only counted because of a recent change in Iowa voting statutes.

"Legislation a couple of years ago made it possible for voters to register on the same day of elections, with the idea to make it available to people who moved or people who have never voted before," said Clay County Auditor Marjorie Pitts. "Instead of having them get registered 10 days before the election, they're able to walk into their precinct and cast a ballot."

Pitts continued: "I was just excited. I was thinking: Well, how special is this -- that someone of this age has, for one, decided to vote and second, is able to vote because of the same day voter registration. It's never too late to participate and vote in an election."

Asked if she would vote in the governor's race in 2010, the now-registered Marion Peters quipped, "I probably won't be around here next year."

Her son was more optimistic about the chance of getting her to the polls again.

"Now that she's registered, I'm sure she will," he said. "I've picked her up (to vote) once, I'll pick her up again."