Japan’s Jiroemon Kimura, recognized by Guinness World Records as the oldest man in recorded history, has died at the age of 116.

Kimura died of natural causes in the hospital in his hometown of Kyotango, western Japan, at 2:08 a.m. Tuesday, the local government said in a faxed statement.

He was hospitalized for pneumonia on May 11.

Born on April 19, 1897, when Queen Victoria reigned over the British Empire, Kimura dodged childhood killers, such as tuberculosis and pneumonia that kept life expectancy in Japan to 44 years at the time of his birth.

He became the oldest man in recorded history on Dec. 28, 2012, at the age of 115 years and 253 days. The oldest woman in recorded history, France’s Jeanne Calment, died in 1997 at the age of 122.

“He has an amazingly strong will to live,” Kimura’s nephew Tamotsu Miyake, 80, said in an interview in December. “He is strongly confident that he lives right and well.”

Kimura was also the world’s oldest living person.

That title goes to Misao Okawa of Japan, who was born on March 5, 1898, according to a list of the world’s oldest people compiled by the Los Angeles-based Genealogy Research Group. The previous record-holder for male longevity, Christian Mortensen of San Rafael, died in 1998 at the age of 115 years and 252 days.

Kimura was among 20 Japanese on the research group’s list of 56 people verified to be age 110 or older, highlighting the challenges facing Japan as its population ages. A combination of the world’s highest life expectancy, the world’s second-largest public debt and a below-replacement birthrate is straining the nation’s pension system, prompting the government to curb payouts, raise contributions and delay the age of eligibility.

Japan’s average life expectancy at birth is 83 years, a figure projected to exceed 90 for women by 2050. Kimura’s wife, Yae, died in 1978 at the age of 74.



