Introduction
Clifford Eubanks Sr. was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on March 13, 1911 to Henry and Marie Eubanks. He boxed professionally, dropped out of high school, but returned to get his diploma at the age of 21. He was still living with his parents in Pittsburgh when the Census was taken in 1940.
Clifford Eubanks moved to Camden in the 1940s. Night courses in chemistry led to a job as a lab assistant with RCA. He and his family were among the first to move into the newly-built Chelton Terrace public housing project homes in 1944, taking up residence at 2106 South 7th Street.
Clifford Eubanks retired from RCA at the age of 65, and went into a second career as a construction laborer. Always physically fit, he was still on the job into his late 70s. He also became fluent in German, Korean, and New Testament Greek.
Clifford Eubanks Sr. passed away on December 17, 1989.
76-year-old laborer still on the job
Lakeland, Florida Ledger —
The Associated Press
PHILADELPHIA — Many of Clifford Eubanks’ co-workers at an RCA laboratory laughed when he spent his lunch hours working out.
“Most of them are dead now,” he says. But Eubanks, a chemist who can read the New Testament in its original Greek, is still hard at work at age 76 — this time with a pick and shovel.
“If I didn’t work like this I would be dead by now,” the muscled Camden, N.J., construction laborer told the Philadelphia Daily News. “I have to exercise my body. If I ever stop, I’m dead.”
His 20-year-old co-worker, Greg Simpkins, is in awe of Eubanks’ stamina as they build luxury homes in nearby Cherry Hill, N.J.
“There’s nobody who can keep up with him. A younger guy will start out faster. But no one will work as long and steady as Cliff,” Simpkins said.
Eubanks launched his new career immediately after his retirement 11 years ago from his job as a lab assistant at an RCA plant in Moorestown, N.J.
Builder John J. Sheridan recalled Eubanks approaching him for a job.
“I saw this 70-year-old man and said, ‘Forget it.’ My skepticism lasted 15 seconds when I realized how sharp his mind was.”
Sheridan added: “To watch him work is like watching ballet. Anytime I hire a new laborer, I put him with Cliff the first day. He makes it, at least I know he is serious about working.”
Eubanks grew up in a rough, racially mixed section of Pittsburgh.
As a teen-ager he fought club fights for loose change, and later boxed professionally, and always stuck to an exercise regimen that included running and weight lifting. He dropped out of high school, but then returned at age 21 for his diploma.
A perforated eardrum kept him out of World War II, but he acquired a technical know-how while working in defense industries that led to his job with RCA.
In his early 40s, Eubanks enrolled in a night course at the University of Pennsylvania. “It took me 15 years, but I got the diploma in chemistry when I was 57,” he said.
He learned German in high school and continued studying, traveling to Germany and Austria, until he became fluent.
A prospect of an export-import job with a Korean native sparked his study of Korean. The job didn’t pan out, but his command of the language flourished.
Eubanks saw another opportunity “to exercise my mind” when a speaker from a Bible college went to his church, offering lessons in New Testament Greek. He was one of three students to complete the course.
Admiring co-workers and buyers of Sheridan’s homes even chipped in with Sheridan to give Eubanks an all-expenses-paid vacation to Egypt and Israel.
Eubanks, married and with six great-grandchildren, said he’ll never retire.
“A lot of men who retired and died would be alive and healthy if they’d worked like I do. Never stop! I work every day. I study a little every night. That’s the secret.”