Washington, DC - The late Dr. Henry Heimlich created the Heimlich Maneuver in 1974. Since then, the simple technique for saving choking victims is estimated to have saved tens of thousands of lives, according to the Association of Mature American Citizens.
Heimlich died of a heart attack in December at the age of 96. Despite the fact that he taught and demonstrated the procedure countless times throughout his life, he almost never got to actually use it himself. But his opportunity came in the last year of his life in the dining room of the senior living facility where he lived when a fellow resident began to choke during dinner.