September 11, 1995, New York Times, Robert Ode, 79, Oldest of Hostages Held by Iran, by Robert McG. Thomas,

September 11, 1995, New York Times, Robert Ode, 79, Oldest of Hostages Held by Iran, by Robert McG. Thomas, 

Robert C. Ode, the oldest of the 52 Americans held hostage for 444 days in Iran, died on Friday at a hospital in Sun City West, Ariz., the retirement community where he had lived since shortly after his release in 1981. He was 79.

His wife, Rita, said the cause of death was pneumonia.

When 500 young Iranian revolutionaries stormed the United States Embassy in Teheran on Nov. 4, 1979, Mr. Ode had a special reason to feel put out.

At the age of 65, not only was he much older than his fellow captives, but he was also a retired Foreign Service officer who had arrived at the embassy barely a month earlier to begin a 45-day temporary assignment.

But Mr. Ode was also far older than his captors, most of them students in their early 20's, and while his advanced years and delicate health caused concern in Washington, during the next 444 days he deftly turned his age -- and his cantankerous nature -- to his advantage.

"The Iranians actually deferred to him," a fellow hostage, Barry Rosen, said on Saturday, recalling with awe the way Mr. Ode, who had never been to Iran, instinctively exploited the Iranian respect for age.

"He knew how to make the most of the junior-senior relationship," said Mr. Rosen, then the embassy's press attache and now a faculty member at Teachers College at Columbia University.

If the sight of Mr. Ode grumpily scolding his captors when he felt inconvenienced -- such as by one of their notorious midnight raids -- raised the morale of his fellow hostages, he also provided more direct comfort to his younger colleagues.

As Mr. Ode put it after his release, "Sometimes I acted as an amateur doctor or an amateur priest."

Mr. Ode brought a special attitude to the ordeal, perhaps because he had seen worse. As a member of the Navy's amphibious service during World War II, his wife recalled on Saturday, Mr. Ode made several Pacific landings. When Gen. Douglas MacArthur made his famous walk through the surf on his celebrated return to the Philippines, she said, Mr. Ode, who had fought his way ashore, was on the beach to watch.

A native of Plano, Ill., who grew up in Manistee, Mich., Mr. Ode was forced to drop out of college after just a few months because of the Depression. He joined the Foreign Service in 1947.

Even though Mr. Ode did not have a college education, he worked his way up from clerical positions to become a Foreign Service officer, holding a number of foreign posts before his mandatory retirement at the age of 60 in 1975.

He was then persuaded to accept a series of temporary assignments, culminating in his Iran duty in 1979.

Mr. Ode, who was hospitalized briefly after his release and underwent heart surgery in 1983, accepted no further temporary State Department assignments.

In addition to his wife, Mr. Ode, who had no children, is survived by a brother, Howard, of Midland, Mich., and a sister, Marjorie Keon of St. Louis, Mich.

Photo: Robert C. Ode (United Press International, 1981)