THE internet has spawned many inexplicable phenomena, but there has never been a cyber hero more unlikely than “Geriatric 1927”.
In the past week, the 79-year-old British widower’s gentle video monologues have become the hottest sensation on the web.
More than a million users of YouTube, the online home video site, have downloaded the six short films posted so far, which purport to be fragments of his life story.
Young people from Singapore to Seattle have responded adoringly to the “inspiring” first episodes of Telling it All, which include droll recollections of life in postwar Leicester, mild grumbles about political correctness and glowing praise for motorbikes (“maybe I’ve got oil in my veins instead of blood”).
Yesterday, a hunt was underway to establish the identity of Geriatric 1927, who appears to be revelling in his anonymity.
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On the site he gives his name only as Peter. He says that he lives alone in central England and that his nom de plume refers to the year of his birth.
Each film features a white-haired man, typically wearing an open-necked shirt and sweater, seated alone in front of patterned wallpaper.
From time to time, he removes his glasses and for most of the filming his eyes are closed. He often teases his audience with snippets of information that he says will be explained at a later date.
An introductory film describes the project as the “Bloggs (Sic) of a geriatric”. Peter explains: “What I hope I will be able to do is just bitch and grumble about life in general from the perspective of an old person who has been there and done that, and hopefully you will respond in some way by your comments.”
He discusses the horrors of war and the joys of demobilisation, when he was issued with a trilby hat. “I wish I’d kept it now because it would be so kitsch as to be, in present terminology, ‘cool’.”
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He became a public health inspector before setting up his own motorcycle accessories business, which he ran until he suffered a liver complaint. His wife, who had worked in fashion, died nine years ago. He was married for more than 40 years. They had two children of their own — a son and a daughter — and fostered a third, a deaf boy who is coming to stay with Peter next month.
Users of YouTube, which has almost 20 million visitors a month, have embraced Peter. “I don’t have a grandpa, but if I could choose, I’d want you to be mine!” wrote one.
Alexander Mair, of the British Geriatrics Society, said Peter was an inspiration. “I think it’s a wonderful thing, though I would not call Peter geriatric at all. He’s got a lot of life in him.”
PETER ON...
The war:
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“The thing that bugged me most of all was that I could not ride my precious motorbike. Petrol was severely rationed . . . but as it goes, I got hold of some occasionally. I expect it was a bit dodgy”
Being conscripted:
“It’s a very brutal initiation, it’s a boot camp system, your brain is supposed to be scrambled so you react like Pavlov’s dog and pull the trigger without question on demand”