I talk to a lot of people who feel like life has passed them by and there is little left for them to do in their retirement years, but it doesn’t have to be that way. There are loads of examples of quite elderly people who have gone on to do amazing things. Colonel Sanders comes to mind. At age 65 he took his first Social Security check to visit potential franchisees. He is reported to have visited 1009 potential candidates before he found success. But Sanders is not alone; not by a long shot. Here a a few notable examples:
Ronald Reagan retired from acting and went into politics becoming our oldest president at age 69.
Casey Stengel retired from baseball and then was called back to manage the beloved Mets at age 71.
Grandma Moses, beloved folk painter, didn’t even pick up a paint brush until she was 77.
At age 79 John Powanda became one of the oldest Peace Corp volunteers.
Dr. Benjamin Spock gained notoriety as a baby doctor in his professional life but at age 83 he was arrested for demonstrating for world peace.
Mary Baker Eddy founded the Christian Science Monitor at age 87. Her newspaper continues to this day.
Marc Chagall finally got his chance to display his work at the Louvre at age 90. He is the only living artist to have done so.
At age 92 Paul Spangler finished his fourteenth marathon.
Mae Laborde began her acting career at age 93. She is 100 now and still appears on television talk shows.
At age 94 comedian George Burns return to the place where he got started in Schenectady, N.Y., 63 years after his first appearance.
Finally, Dorothy Geeban may be America’s oldest mayor. She presides over city dealings in the little town of Ocean Breeze, Florida, at age 100.
Now if you knew you would live to be 100, what great things would you accomplish!
