Farewell to a Fiery Longevity: 'World's Oldest Smoker' Jan Steenberg Dies at Claimed 121, Hours After Birthday Bash

 

Johannesburg, South Africa, January 25, 2026 – In a poignant twist that blends triumph and tragedy, Jan Steenberg – the self-proclaimed world's oldest smoker and a living rebuke to medical orthodoxy – passed away on New Year's Day from a sudden asthma attack, mere hours after toasting what he insisted was his 121st birthday. The grizzled patriarch from the sleepy village of Colchester in South Africa's Eastern Cape had puffed away at hand-rolled cigarettes for 107 years, starting at age 14, amassing a lifetime tally that could rival a small tobacco plantation. His improbable endurance, defying decades of dire health warnings, had catapulted him to global curiosity, fueling endless debates on the enigmas of extreme age: Is it unyielding genes, sheer stubbornness, or a cosmic joke on epidemiology? As tributes pour in from afar, physicians worldwide reiterate a somber refrain: Smoking's lethal shadow spares no one, no matter how brightly the exceptions burn.

Steenberg, affectionately dubbed "Oom Jan" (Uncle Jan) by locals, breathed his last in the modest confines of his thatched home, surrounded by family and the faint haze of his final smoke. The attack struck without mercy around 8 p.m. on January 1, following a raucous village gathering where he regaled guests with tales of outlasting two world wars, apartheid's grip, and countless quit-smoking campaigns. Born on January 1, 1905 (per his unverified family Bible records), the former farmhand and occasional fisherman celebrated with homemade mampoer (peach brandy), a chorus of "Happy Birthday," and – naturally – a fresh cigarette pinched between callused fingers. "I've got no time for doctors' nonsense," he quipped earlier that day to a cluster of wide-eyed grandchildren, exhaling a plume that danced in the summer dusk. "The Good Lord decides when the pipe's out; not some pill-pusher."

Word of his passing spread like veldt fire across social media, igniting a torrent of reflections. On X (formerly Twitter), users marveled at his audacity: "Oom Jan smoked through a century-plus and only an asthma fit got him? Genetics: 1, Science: 0," tweeted one admirer, while another countered, "Inspirational survivor or walking ad for why you quit? RIP, but don't romanticize the reaper." Steenberg's story first flickered into international spotlights in 2018, when a local reporter's viral profile pegged him as the planet's longest-lived tobacco devotee, eclipsing tales of chain-smoking Frenchwomen and boozy Russian babushkas. Gerontologists flocked to Colchester, a dusty speck 800 kilometers east of Cape Town, armed with spirometers and skepticism. Tests revealed lungs scarred like ancient bark but improbably functional – a puzzle attributed to perhaps rare genetic mutations shielding against tar's toll, or the rural air's purity untouched by urban smog.

Steenberg's odyssey began in the shadow of the Anglo-Boer War's embers, on a hardscrabble farm where tobacco was currency and survival an art. Orphaned young, he apprenticed as a shepherd, rolling his first "stogie" from cornhusks at 14 to steady nerves amid hyena howls. "It calmed the beasts in my head," he later recounted in a 2022 BBC interview, his gravelly baritone laced with defiance. Marriage to childhood sweetheart Anna in 1930 yielded eight children, 24 grandchildren, and a brood that swelled to 50 great-grandkids – all raised on tales of Oom Jan's unquenchable vice.

Through the Great Depression, World War II (where he dodged conscription by feigning frailty), and the upheavals of 1994's democracy dawn, Steenberg's ritual endured: five to ten hand-rolled smokes daily, sans filter or filter, washed down with rooibos tea. He outlived Anna by 15 years, crediting her "fiery spirit" for his vigor, and shrugged off cancers that felled peers. "I've buried friends who never touched a drag," he'd chuckle, tapping ash onto sun-baked earth. His secret? A diet of wild greens, goat milk, and "a laugh a day" – plus, locals whisper, a dash of ancestral Zulu herbs slipped into his pipe.

Yet, for all his folklore, Steenberg's age remains a gray zone. South Africa's patchy vital records – ravaged by colonial upheavals and apartheid-era neglect – couldn't corroborate his 121 claim, though facial recognition software and dental wear pegged him in his late 110s. Guinness World Records demurred on officialdom, citing verification hurdles, but the man himself was unequivocal: "Count the rings on this old baobab if you doubt me."

Steenberg's exit has reignited the tinderbox of longevity lore, where outliers like him – think Jeanne Calment, the 122-year-old French supercentenarian who chain-smoked till 117 – challenge the ironclad edicts of public health. Epidemiologists, poring over his case, point to the FOXO3 gene variant, a "longevity switch" documented in Okinawan elders that may blunt oxidative stress from nicotine. "He's the exception proving the rule," cautions Dr. Maria Gonzalez, a pulmonologist at the University of Cape Town. "For every Oom Jan, millions perish prematurely from COPD, heart disease, and cancers – smoking claims 8 million lives yearly, per WHO stats. Don't let anecdotes eclipse evidence."

Social media echoes the divide. Pro-smokers hail him as a "middle finger to nanny states," while anti-tobacco advocates decry glamorization: "One man's miracle is a generation's morbidity," posts one thread with 50,000 likes. In South Africa, where tobacco use afflicts 20% of adults and lung cancer rates spike in the Eastern Cape, Steenberg's tale stokes calls for stricter ad bans and cessation programs. The Health Department, issuing a statement on January 2, mourned his loss while urging: "Honor his memory by choosing breath over burn."

Back in Colchester, where goats graze amid thornbushes, Steenberg's funeral on January 10 drew 300 mourners to the Dutch Reformed Church. His eldest son, 85-year-old Pieter, eulogized: "Pa taught us fire tempers the soul – but even flames flicker out." The family plans a memorial garden, planted with tobacco-free sunflowers, symbolizing renewal.