Fountain Of Youth? As Easy As Pie

Steve Hartman Reports For Assignment America On A 30-Year-Old Pledge To Have A Pie Fight

(CBS)  It was a formal occasion - folks dressed up in their finest finery, all gathered for a Milwaukee happening. A happening more than 30 years in the making, CBS News correspondent Steve Hartman reports.

"It's better than a wedding," one guest said.

The hosts for the evening were best friends Malcolm McDowell and Dan Johnson, both 50 years old. They thought of this back when they were freshmen in college. They were sitting in a restaurant - just 18 at the time - but already dreading 50.

"Yeah, 50 is old. When you're 18 and you look at a 50-year-old - they're old," Johnson said.

McDowell added: "Fifty years old seemed responsible and serious and boring."

God forbid they ever become that - so the guys decided right then and there to make a pact.

They promised that when they turned 50, as a hedge against maturity, to do something utterly ridiculous.

Of course, over the next three decades, in many ways, they became just who they were afraid they would. They got married, had kids, and own homes.

McDowell is now the editor of a trade magazine, and Johnson is a customer service manager. But they stayed friends and never forgot their pledge - that no matter how serious life got, when they hit 50, they'd have … a pie fight.

That was the pact. To have a pie fight.

Originally, it was supposed to be just the two of them. But over the years, the more friends and family heard about it - the more friends and family wanted to be a part of it.

Needless to say, the event was neither responsible, serious, nor the least bit boring. In fact, Johnson and McDowell say it was so much less mature than they ever could have imagined. And the timing was perfect.

"The economy is terrible, there's a war - people need to do things totally unlike what they usually are like," one guest said.

"Every time I ask somebody a question!" Hartman exclaimed as he got hit by a pie.

"God, I feel like I'm 16 again!" one guest said.

So much for the elusive fountain of youth - turns out finding it is as easy as pie.

[lizzie03-2009]

earlier on the local CBS news they had a story of a
woman who fed her children & after they left the table to do homework licked their plates because she had no food for herself. So the story of a bunch of insensitive,moronic 50 some olds who waste food and pies throwing them in each other''s faces is not only
in extremely poor taste but says alot about some
idiots who waste time & money in these hard times
attempting to regain their youth?? I wonder if its all the beer they have in the air there????Bad choice of a story.....very bad.

[lemkero]

For 30 years, how cool to have a committment to your friendship! Nice to see that your sense of humor has not been lost at 50, and you find life is worth celebrating. Too bad the story didn''t mention that the shaving cream pies were used to raise money for charity. Hardly incensitive.

[markfingar]

We enjoyed the pie fight so much. It was so well timed after the doom and gloom of the news. It''s at times like these we need some humour...and it sure beats a sharp stick in the eye. Nice job Steve Hartman!!!

[tosajohnsons]

Responding to the Lizzie03 whack-job entitiy:
I figured we%u2019d get this kind of knee-jerk %u2018Oh what a waste of resources%u2019 whine. The fact that Malc works to support holistic foods and Dan sends an inordinate amount of money (that means a lot) to the United Way as well as other various charities wasn%u2019t going to matter once we decided to spend almost $100 (gasp!) on paper plates and shaving cream. (Again, forget the $1000 we raised for our two favorite charities not counting the amount spent by folks buying their formals at various Goodwill and other resale shops.) I missed the story on the woman licking plates, but if she was as narrow-minded and had the same spelling/capitalization/punctuation issues as lizzie03 it%u2019s no surprise she doesn%u2019t have a real job. I%u2019m glad this kind of buzzkill wasn%u2019t invited to our party. Man, that was a good party! Glad Liz wasn%u2019t there.

Dan Johnson
(One of the guys who waited 32 years for the party.)

[tosajohnsons]

Responding to the Lizzie03 whack-job entitiy:
I figured we%u2019d get this kind of knee-jerk %u2018Oh what a waste of resources%u2019 whine. The fact that Malc works to support holistic foods and Dan sends an inordinate amount of money (that means a lot) to the United Way as well as other various charities wasn%u2019t going to matter once we decided to spend almost $100 (gasp!) on paper plates and shaving cream. (Again, forget the $1000 we raised for our two favorite charities not counting the amount spent by folks buying their formals at various Goodwill and other resale shops.) I missed the story on the woman licking plates, but if she was as narrow-minded and had the same spelling/capitalization/punctuation issues as lizzie03 it%u2019s no surprise she doesn%u2019t have a real job. I%u2019m glad this kind of buzzkill wasn%u2019t invited to our party. Man, that was a good party! Glad Liz wasn%u2019t there.

Dan Johnson
(One of the guys who waited 32 years for the party.)

[rbud925]

One more for Lizzie--although I hate to focus on the negative after such a positive event...
HOW DARE YOU! How dare you make a judgment about people you don''t even know and an event that you know about from a 2 minute news story! Dan and Malcolm are two of the most generous people you will ever want to meet. They selected shaving cream and paper plates because they DIDN''T want to waste food or do anything ecologically unfriendly. The cream pies were donated at the last minute by a local bakery.
The event raised $1,000 for 2 wonderful charities and spent about $100 on supplies to entertain 150 people. It has since brought joy to countless people at a much needed time.
Get over yourself!