3 fans. 60 Super Bowls. This might be their last time going to the big game

KENNEBUNK, Maine (AP) — It just wouldn't feel like the Super Bowl for them if they weren't all there. And this might be the last time they all do it.

That's what three old friends were coming to grips with just before this year's Super Bowl. The trio of octogenarians are the only fans left in the exclusive “never missed a Super Bowl” club.

Don Crisman of Maine, Gregory Eaton of Michigan and Tom Henschel of Florida were back for another big game this year. But two of them are grappling with the fact that advancing years and decreasing mobility mean this is probably the last time.

This year's game pits the Seattle Seahawks against the New England Patriots at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, California, on Sunday. Crisman, a Patriots fan since the franchise started, was excited to see his team in the game for a record-setting 12th time.

“This will definitely be the final one,” said Crisman, who made the trip with his daughter, Susan Metevier. “We made it to 60.”

Crisman, who first met Henschel at the 1983 Super Bowl, turns 90 this year. Meanwhile, Henschel, 84, has been slowed by a stroke. Both said this is the last time they'll make the increasingly expensive trip to the game, although members of the group have said that before. For his part, Eaton, 86, plans to keep going as long as he’s still physically able.

Eaton, who runs a ground transportation company in Detroit, is the only member of the group not retired. And he’d still like to finally see his beloved Detroit Lions make it to a Super Bowl.

Even so, all three said they’ve scaled back the time they dedicate each year to the trip. Crisman used to spend a week in the host city, soaking in the pomp and pageantry. These days, it's just about the game, not the hype.

“We don't go for a week anymore, we go for three or four days,” Crisman said.

Eaton, too, admits the price and hype of the big game have gotten to be a lot.

“I think all of them are big, they're all fun. It's just gotten so commercial. It's a $10,000 trip now,” he said.

Henschel said this year's Super Bowl would be the most challenging for him because of his stroke, but he was excited to see Eaton and Crisman one more time.

Eaton met Crisman and Henschel in the mid-2010s after years of attending the Super Bowl separately. And Henschel and Crisman have a long-running rivalry: Their respective favorite teams — the Pittsburgh Steelers and the New England Patriots — are AFC rivals.

The fans have attended every game since the first AFL-NFL World Championship Game, as the first two Super Bowls were known at the time, in 1967. They have sometimes sat together in the past, but logistics make it impossible some years.

But this year it was just about being able to go to the game at all, Henschel said.

“I don’t talk or walk good,” he said.

The club of people who have never missed a Super Bowl once included other fans, executives, media members and even groundskeepers, but as time has passed, the group has shrunk. Photographer John Biever, who has shot every Super Bowl, also plans to let his streak end at 60.

The three fans spin tales of past games that often focus less on the action on the field than on the different world where old Super Bowls took place. Henschel scored a $12 ticket for the 1969 Super Bowl the day of the game. Crisman endured a 24-hour train ride to Miami for the 1968 Super Bowl. Eaton, who is Black, remembers the many years before Doug Williams became the first Black quarterback to win a Super Bowl in 1988.

Metevier, Crisman's daughter, was born the year of the first Super Bowl and grew up with her dad's streak as a fixture in her life. She's looking forward to going to one last game with him.

“It's kind of bittersweet. It's about the memories,” Metevier said. “It's not just about the football, it's something more.”

Crisman's son, Don Crisman Jr., said he's on board with his dad making the trip for as long as he's still able, too.

“You know, he's a little long in the tooth, but the way I put it, if it was me and I was mobile and I could go, I would damn sure go,” he said.

Don Crisman wears his shirt from Super Bowl 56 in 2022, when the Los Angeles Rams defeated the Cincinnati Bengals, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Kennebunk, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

Don Crisman holds a copy of the official program for Super Bowl 50, which featured a story on a small group of fans, including Crisman, who had attended every championship game, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Kennebunk, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

Don Crisman holds a Super Bowl 38 souvenir hat signed by Hall of Fame quarterback Tom Brady, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Kennebunk, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

Don Crisman, one of only three remaining members of the "Never Miss a Super Bowl Club" to attend every championship game since 1967, models a souvenir hat from the first game, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Kennebunk, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

FILE — Members of the Never Miss a Super Bowl Club, from the left, Tom Henschel, Gregory Eaton, and Don Crisman pose for a group photograph during a welcome luncheon, in Atlanta, Feb. 1, 2019. (Hyosub Shin/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP, File)

AL-HOL, Syria (AP) — Basic services at a camp in northeast Syria holding thousands of women and children linked to the Islamic State group are returning to normal after government forces captured the facility from Kurdish fighters, a United Nations official said on Thursday.

Forces of Syria’s central government captured al-Hol camp on Jan. 21 during a weekslong offensive against the Kurdish-led and U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, that had been running the camp near the border with Iraq for a decade. A ceasefire deal has since ended the fighting.

Celine Schmitt, a spokesperson for the U.N. refugees agency told The Associated Press that the interruption of services occurred for two days during the fighting around the camp.

She said a UNHCR team visited the recaptured came to establish “very quickly the delivery of basic services, humanitarian services,” including access to health centers. Schmitt said that as of Jan. 23, they were able to deliver bread and water inside the camp.

Schmitt, speaking in Damascus, said the situation at al-Hol camp has been calm and some humanitarian actors have also been distributing food parcels. She said that government has named a new administrator for the camp.

At its peak after the defeat of IS in Syria in 2019, around 73,000 people were living at al-Hol. Since then the number has declined with some countries repatriating their citizens. The camp’s residents are mostly children and women, including many wives or widows of IS members.

The camp's residents are not technically prisoners and most have not been accused of crimes, but they have been held in de facto detention at the heavily guarded facility.

The current population is about 24,000, including 14,500 Syrians and nearly 3,000 Iraqis. About 6,500 from other nationalities are held in a highly secured section of the camp, many of whom are IS supporters who came from around the world to join the extremist group.

The U.S. last month began transfering some of the 9,000 IS members from jails in northeast Syria to Iraq. Baghdad said it will prosecute the transfered detainees. But so far, no solution has been announced for al-Hol camp and the similar Roj camp.

Amal al-Hussein of the Syria Alyamama Foundation, a humanitarian group, told the AP that all the clinics in the camp's medical facility are working 24 hours a day, adding that up to 150 children and 100 women are treated daily.

She added that over the past 10 days there have been five natural births in the camp while cesarean cases were referred to hospitals in the eastern province of Deir el-Zour or al-Hol town.

She said that there are shortages of baby formula, diapers and adult diapers in the camp.

A resident of the camp for eight years, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to concerns over the safety of her family, said there have been food shortages, while the worst thing is a lack of proper education for her children.

“We want clothes for the children, as well as canned food, vegetables and fruits,” she said, speaking inside a tent surrounded by three of her daughters, adding that the family has not had vegetables and fruits for a month because the items are too expensive for most of the camp residents.

Mariam al-Issa, from the northern Syrian town of Safira, said she wants to leave the camp along with her children so that thy can have proper education and eat good food.

“Because of the financial conditions we cannot live well,” she said. “The food basket includes lentils but the children don’t like to eat it any more.”

“The children crave everything,” al-Issa said, adding that food at the camp should be improved from mostly bread and water. “It has been a month since we didn’t have a decent meal,” she said.

Thousands of Syrians and Iraqis have returned to their homes in recent years, but many only return to find destroyed homes and no jobs as most Syrians remain living in poverty as a result of the conflict that started in March 2011.

Schmitt said investment is needed to help people who return home to feel safe. “They need to get support in order to have a house, to be able to rebuild a house in order to have an income,” she said.

“Investments to respond and to overcome the huge material challenges people face when they return home,” she added.

This story was published Feb. 5, 2026, and updated Feb. 6 to remove the name of a camp resident who requested anonymity due to concerns over the safety of her family.

Shaheen reported from Damascus.

Women receive medication and treatment for their children at a medical center in the al-Hol camp, one of the detention facilities holding thousands of Islamic State group members and their families, now under the control of the Syrian government following the withdrawal of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), in al-Hassakeh province, northeastern Syria, Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)

An aerial view shows the town of al-Hol and, in the background, the camp, which holds thousands of Islamic State group members and their families and is now under the control of the Syrian government following the withdrawal of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), in al-Hassakeh province, northeastern Syria, Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)

Residents walk along the al-Hol camp, one of the detention facilities holding thousands of Islamic State group members and their families, now under the control of the Syrian government following the withdrawal of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), in al-Hassakeh province, northeastern Syria, Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)

Women wait at a medical center in the al-Hol camp, one of the detention facilities holding thousands of Islamic State group members and their families, now under the control of the Syrian government following the withdrawal of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), in al-Hassakeh province, northeastern Syria, Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)