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At 79, Dean Hinmon is reliving his youth by portraying someone who lived to be 100.

For more than two years, the Albuquerque man has been performing "An Evening With George Burns," his one-man show based on the personality and sketches of comedian Burns.

Burns, who died in 1996 more than a month after he passed the century mark, was among a group of comics — Jack Benny and Red Skelton were others — that Hinmon followed when he was a kid.

"I grew up with them, first on radio and then on TV," Hinmon said. "I loved them all."

But it is Burns whom Hinmon breathes life into on stage. He has played the part 250 times in shows throughout New Mexico and in other states from Arizona to Wisconsin.

"I'm having so much fun," Hinmon said. "I know so much about George. I've read books by him and about him. I've watched videos of him."

He said it's gotten to the point where Burns sometimes shows up unexpectedly and takes control of Hinmon — even when he's not on stage.

"Sometimes I can sense him sitting beside me as I drive," he said. "I have to be careful; I don't want him ruining my reputation."

He said he sometimes tries out new jokes on Burns.

"I had this one I thought was pretty good, and he didn't like it," Hinmon said. "I bet him $5 it would work. I tried it out in a show, and it got a laugh. But try to collect $5 from someone who's been gone for more than 10 years."

Burns' career spanned vaudeville, film, radio and TV, and often featured him playing straight man to his wife, the zany comedian Gracie Allen.

Burns won an Academy Award for best supporting actor for his role as an aging vaudevillian in 1975's "The Sunshine Boys" and played God Almighty in the 1977 movie "Oh, God" and two sequels.

Hinmon grew up in Iowa and Wisconsin and spent most of his working life in Minnesota.

"I'm still trying to thaw out," he said.

Hinmon was a teacher. He starting out teaching high school science in Rush City, Minn., in 1953 and later taught education philosophy and education psychology at a University of Minnesota branch in Morris, Minn.

He did community theater, but he said he really started using comedy as a teaching tool, something to hold his students' attention.

Hinmon moved to New Mexico 22 years ago and has lived in Taos, Santa Fe, near Madrid, Truth or Consequences and Albuquerque.

It was Albuquerque comedy producer Ronn Perea who suggested Hinmon do a one-man show as Burns.

Put Hinmon in glasses and a tux, stick a cigar in his fist and stand him behind a mike in subdued lighting, and there is a physical resemblance between him and Burns.

Hinmon said the toughest thing about playing Burns convincingly is getting the gravelly voice right.

"I caught on to the (comic) timing early on," he said. "I think I have a natural instinct for it. You need to pause just long enough to hold an audience in anticipation before delivering the punch line."

He said he had a strange, almost out-of-body, experience during one performance.

"It was like George was really doing the show, and I had just been sitting there listening," he said.

That might have been a good time to collect that $5.