Hikers follow in footsteps of Blue Hills ‘mayor’

“You’re a kid. You’re all kids,’’ he says to young couples and retirees alike as about 30 members of the Blue Hills Adult Walking Club gather for a couple hours of social exercise.

Spry for a man born in 1921, DeSantis is stylish, his left hand rotating the tip of his walking stick like a dance cane, and right hand gesturing as he delivers his trademark zingers. “What’s-his-name is here! Now we can go!’’ he shouts as he spots a tardy friend, three minutes late for the event.

DeSantis, known to some as the Mayor of the Blue Hills, is a regular fixture in the hiking community in the suburbs south of Boston. He is often described as “an inspiration’’ by park rangers, volunteers, and friends from the trails. About the mayoral title, he quips: “Only thing is, I only got two votes.’’

The moniker suits him, said Maggi Brown, supervisory ranger for the state Department of Conservation and Recreation’s Blue Hills Reservation.

“Eddie is a kind of jack-of-all-trades here,’’ she said.

On April 20, DeSantis, a Canton resident of 43 years, will mark turning 90 with a 4-mile birthday hike in a section of the 7,000-acre state park that spans Quincy, Dedham, Milton, and Randolph.

DeSantis became involved with the reservation a decade ago when he began regular hikes along the banks of its 230-acre Ponkapoag Pond, located five minutes from his home.

He was seeking a touchstone. Two years earlier, he had lost his wife, Jen nie, whom he met at 18 dancing the jitterbug in the North End. For nearly 60 years, she was his wife and trail partner.

“She loved to walk with me,’’ he said, describing weekend trips to New Hampshire’s White Mountains, to the spot where, as a youth in the federal government’s Civilian Conservation Corps, he fell in love with hiking.

After his wife’s death, DeSantis, then 78, sought solace in his longtime occupation as a barber at The Boston Globe, keeping busy with haircuts and easy banter in the shop he ran for more than 30 years.

But the next year, his failing health landed him in the hospital, and he endured colon-related surgery that required 18 blood transfusions. He knew his days as a barber were over; it was time to retire.

His recovery left him spending long days alone in his ranch home. At that point, DeSantis was feeling “like a goner,’’ he says.

He decided to begin walking the trails at Ponkapoag Pond.

One Saturday, he joined the Blue Hills walking group for an event, and enjoyed the camaraderie. So he volunteered to patrol the “Ponkapoag beat’’ as a guardian for DCR Blue Hills TrailWatch, a group of recreational hikers assigned to act as “eyes and ears’’ for the park’s rangers. He paid attention to monitoring and clearing trails, flicking away “dead fall’’ with the same wooden stick he carries today.

DeSantis explored many of the 125 trails within the reservation by joining group hikes run by the Blue Hills and chapters of the Appalachian Mountain Club. Sometimes he car-pooled with other walkers to trailhead locations, but often, as now, he preferred simply to drive himself. He hiked an average of 30 to 40 miles per week during most of his 80s.

In time, hiking renewed his sense of community, health, even his appetite.

“If it wasn’t for walking, I think I’d be dead,’’ he said. “It gave me a new outlook. . . . Now I see the birds, the scenery, the life that is out there.’’

Now he is present, enjoying his role as a father of one; a grandfather of five; a great-grandfather of four; and, in June, perhaps, a great-great grandfather of one. All of whom he wants to get hiking.

His friends honor him.

“I like to say to people, ‘If Eddie can do this and he’s 90, you can get it done,’ ’’ said Ranger Ray McKinnon.

Marion McNair of Randolph, a trim 55-year-old, remembers when DeSantis passed her during a first walk with the Blue Hills club. “Uh-oh,’’ she said. “No way is that going to happen again.’’

Just visualizing the occurrence bolsters her determination. Now, three years later, she keeps pace with DeSantis, and, sometimes, she passes him.

“When you don’t feel like going, he gets you here,’’ said Larine Watson, 70, a Sharon resident. “You think, ‘Eddie is going to show us up.’ ’’

On this recent spring hike, DeSantis is often at the front of the pack, cresting hills at a pace that leads one young woman to joke that her legs are on fire. People tell stories about DeSantis, about the ways he welcomed them to the walks.

They say DeSantis, the last of eight born to an Italian family on Hanover Street in Boston, offers them hope.

His confident walking pace makes aging less frightening; his Old World manners remind the ladies of romance; his faith teaches them courage.

Close friends know he is about to become the first of “the boys’’ in his family to make it to 90. His five brothers lived into their 70s; his two sisters lived to be 92 and 94. He jokes about gaining membership in the “exclusive 90s club.’’

“Look at him,’’ Roberta Tumbleson, 69, a Sharon resident, says as she strides along the rocky path with her cross-country ski poles in hand. “He is 20 years older than me and has fewer wrinkles.’’

She and Barbara Bergquist, 68, a Needham resident, keep a solid pace in the middle of the group as they debate whether his beautiful skin is courtesy of Italian roots.

“I think his secret is that positive attitude. He is always upbeat,’’ Bergquist say.

Soon DeSantis appears, walking almost between the women, leading by only a slight, polite margin, flanked on either side.

Maureen Pryor, 62, a Canton resident, relatively new to group hikes, says DeSantis looks familiar. When he hands out butterscotch candies to all the hikers at halfway, as he has done for a half-dozen years, she knows why. He is the Mayor of the Blue Hills.

Meg Murphy can be reached at msmegmurphy@gmail.com.