History of AARP

QUOTE from Elizabeth Taylor: "Some of my best leading men have been dogs and horses."

What I LEARNED today: I've belonged to an organization called AARP for 20 years. So being a curious person and a student of history I had to find out where this thing called AARP came from.

Dr. Ethel Percy Andrus founded AARP in 1958. She was a retired school principal from California. AARP evolved from the National Retired Teachers Association (NTRA), which Andrus had established in 1947 to promote her philosophy of productive aging, and in response to the need of health insurance for retired teachers. Because of demand from other senior citizens who needed health insurance she opened the NTRA, in 1958, to all Americans over 50, thus creating AARP. Today, NRTA is a division within AARP. In 2010 AARPs membership has grown to over 40 million members. And AARP has diversified into an organization that offers many other services to its members and is a lobbying watchdog in Congress and in local governments to protect its members from losing Medicare and Social Security benefits.

Medicare was passed in 1965 and to a great extent solved the need for health care for seniors but supplemental insurance was still needed and still is today. AARP has helped alleviate that need along with many other insurance companies.

I'm GRATEFUL that AARP stands and fights for its members. It played a large role in keeping Social Security from being privatized during the Bush years. And it grudgingly endorsed the Part D Prescription Plan that Congress passed in 2003. It only did so when they recognized it was better to get something in regard to drug costs than nothing. With 40 million members AARP is recognized as one of the strongest lobbying groups in the U.S. - and I'm grateful.

AARP has three founding principles:
1. To promote independence, dignity, and purpose for older persons.
2. To enhance the quality for older persons.
3. To encourage older persons "To serve, not be served."

HUMOR for today. In the winter I take my morning walks at Walmart. I've become pretty well known to all the employees. We always exchange "Good Mornings" and ask how each other is doing. I finally came up with a catchy answer this winter when asked every day how I was doing. So now I'm answering them by saying, "At age 70 IHIV." They started asking what that means and I told them - it means "I'm 70 years old and I'm healthy and I'm still vertical." They get a kick out of that.