GULFPORT, Miss. (WLOX) - Not everybody gets to blow out the big 100 on a cake, but for veteran Todd Wendler, it’s a day he told his daughters he would see.

“When we were kids, he always said jokingly that he would live to be 100, and I’ll be damned if he didn’t,” Karen Leib, Wendler’s daughter, said.

With ice cream, cake, and friends, Wendler marked a milestone.

The secret? He says there isn’t one, and God is the only one who knows.

“When I walked through that door and all that clapping, boy tears came to my eyes. It’s overwhelming, I didn’t know I had this many friends and all these people love me, that’s a good feeling,” Wendler said.

Wendler is a multi-branch veteran, having served in the Army, Navy, and Air Force, starting when he was first drafted at 18 years old.

“I was just a

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