60 Fun Facts About Retirement Party

Which country was the first to introduce state retirement benefits, in 1889?

Germany. Otto von Bismarck, a conservative chancellor, backed old-age pensions largely to draw workers away from the socialist movement.

Which Roman emperor retired in 305 to an Adriatic palace now at the centre of Split, Croatia?

Diocletian. Asked to return to power, he is said to have replied that nobody who saw the cabbages he had planted with his own hands would ask.

Which Roman emperor set up a state pension for army veterans in 13 BC?

Augustus. In one of the earliest pension schemes on record, veterans got a lump sum after 16 years in a legion and four in reserve, and he later created inheritance and sales taxes to pay for it.

Which US president signed the Social Security Act on August 14, 1935?

Franklin D. Roosevelt insisted workers pay in through payroll taxes so that, as he put it, no politician could ever scrap the programme.

Ida May Fuller of Vermont was the first person to receive what, in 1940?

A monthly Social Security cheque. Fuller, a retired legal secretary, had paid in for about three years; she lived to 100 and collected $22,888.92.

Which country saw months of strikes in 2023 over a law raising its retirement age from 62 to 64?

France. President Emmanuel Macron's government pushed the change through without a final vote in the National Assembly, using the constitution's Article 49.3.

The 401(k) retirement plan takes its name from what?

A section of the US tax code. Benefits consultant Ted Benna spotted that subsection 401(k) could let employees save pre-tax pay, and built a plan around it at his own firm.

In The Golden Girls, Sophia moves in with her daughter after a fire at which retirement home?

Shady Pines. Sophia was written as a minor character, but the pilot's audience took to Estelle Getty so strongly that she replaced the planned live-in housekeeper.

The 1974 law known as ERISA created which tax-advantaged savings account?

The IRA. It was meant for workers whose jobs came with no pension plan; only in 1981 did a new tax law open IRAs to every working taxpayer.

Which carmaker's 1963 plant closure, stranding workers' pensions, spurred US pension reform?

Studebaker. When its South Bend, Indiana, plant shut, thousands of workers lost some or all of their promised pensions, and the outcry led Congress to insure private pensions in 1974.

Which retirement account is named after the Delaware senator who sponsored it in 1997?

The Roth IRA. William Roth and fellow senator Bob Packwood had proposed it in 1989 as the 'IRA Plus', eight years before it passed under his name.

Which organisation for older Americans did retired high-school principal Ethel Percy Andrus found in 1958?

AARP. Andrus first organised retired teachers to win them health insurance, then opened the idea to all older Americans.

Which fictional detective retires to a small farm on the South Downs to keep bees?

Sherlock Holmes. Conan Doyle has him write a 'Practical Handbook of Bee Culture' in retirement, then use the book to trick a German spy on the eve of the First World War.

Which president signed Medicare into law in 1965?

Lyndon B. Johnson travelled to Independence, Missouri, to sign the bill beside Harry Truman, whose own push for national health insurance had failed two decades earlier.

Which lettered section of Medicare covers self-administered prescription drugs?

D. Medicare ran for four decades without a pharmacy benefit; Part D arrived in 2006 and is sold only through private insurers.

Which fast-food founder sold his roadside restaurant at 65 and took to the road to franchise his recipe?

Colonel Sanders. A new interstate had pulled traffic away from his Kentucky restaurant, so he sold it and drove around signing up restaurants to cook his chicken for a few cents a bird.

Retirement-town developer Del Webb was once co-owner of which New York sports franchise?

The Yankees. Webb and Dan Topping bought into the club in 1945, saw it win ten World Series, then sold control to the CBS television network in 1964.

Which Arizona retirement community, opened by Del Webb in 1960, drew 100,000 visitors on its first weekend?

Sun City. Home sales ran far ahead of the company's forecasts, and in 1962 Time magazine put its builder on the cover.

Which animation director announced his retirement in 2013, then came back with a new feature ten years later?

Hayao Miyazaki. His producer said he made The Boy and the Heron for his grandson, as a way of saying that Grandpa was moving on but leaving this film behind.

The Villages, Florida's sprawling retirement community, lies northwest of which city?

Orlando. The Villages grew out of a 400-unit mobile-home park run by its founder, who had earlier sold land by mail order.

Ryderwood, Washington, a retirement town since 1953, was built in the 1920s to house workers in which industry?

Logging. The Long-Bell Lumber Company built it as the 'World's Largest Logging Town', then three decades later sold the entire town to a developer who reopened it for retirees.

Retirees who head south each winter to escape the cold are commonly known as what?

Snowbirds. The word first meant real birds seen mostly in winter, such as the junco; by the 1920s it was being used for workers who went south for the cold months.

Britain's first state old-age pensions, paid from 1909, were collected each week at which institution?

The post office. Ministers kept the five-shilling pension away from the Poor Law authorities so that collecting it carried no stigma of charity.

In Australia and New Zealand, a workplace retirement plan is commonly called what?

Superannuation. Australians shorten it to 'super', and in 1992 the Keating government made it compulsory for employers to pay part of each worker's wages into a fund.

Which country marks Respect for the Aged Day as a public holiday each September?

Japan. It was fixed on September 15 until 2003, when the 'Happy Monday' reforms moved it to a Monday to give workers a three-day weekend.

A retired professor who keeps the use of their title is styled what?

Emeritus. In Latin the word described a veteran soldier who had served out his time and earned his discharge.

In business slang, what is a 'golden handshake'?

A generous severance payment. It is often offered to coax someone into early retirement, whereas a 'golden hello' is the bonus paid to lure a new recruit.

The four older women of The Golden Girls shared a house in which city?

Miami. Estelle Getty, who played the elderly mother, was in fact a year younger than Bea Arthur, who played her daughter.

In the 1985 film Cocoon, Florida retirees feel young again after swimming in a pool charged by whom?

Aliens. The visitors are using the pool to keep their cocooned companions alive, and the retirees next door keep sneaking in; Don Ameche won an Oscar for his role.

Which two actors play the terminally ill men in The Bucket List (2007)?

Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman. The phrase 'bucket list', built on 'kick the bucket', was barely recorded before the film: dictionaries date it only to 2006.

Jack Nicholson plays a newly retired insurance man in which 2002 Alexander Payne film?

About Schmidt. With nobody else to confide in, Warren Schmidt pours out his frustrations in long letters to Ndugu, a six-year-old Tanzanian boy he sponsors through a charity.

In Pixar's Up, Carl floats his house by balloon to which South American destination?

Paradise Falls. Carl and his wife Ellie saved for the trip all their married life but kept having to spend the money, and he sets off only after her death.

Grumpy Old Men (1993) reunited which two long-time screen partners as feuding Minnesota neighbours?

Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau. Real-life friends who made ten films together, they turned this one into enough of a hit to earn a sequel two years later.

In The Intern (2015), Robert De Niro's 70-year-old widower becomes an intern at what kind of company?

A fashion website. Its headquarters is the very building where De Niro's character spent his career making phone books, and he and his boss bond when she finds out.

In which country is The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel's retirement hotel?

India. The British pensioners reach Jaipur to find that the luxurious retirement hotel in the brochure is really a dilapidated building run by an eager novice.

In which 2017 comedy do three retirees rob a bank after losing their pensions?

Going in Style. In the 1979 original the three friends robbed a bank just for kicks; in the remake they hit the very bank that holds their lost pension money.

In Space Cowboys (2000), four ageing former test pilots are sent into orbit to do what?

Repair an old Soviet satellite. Its electronics are so antiquated that only the retired engineer who designed the original system, Clint Eastwood's character, still understands them.

Michael Jordan retired from the Bulls before the 1993-94 season to try which sport?

Baseball. Jordan said he was chasing a dream of his late father, who had been murdered months earlier, and spent the 1994 season with the minor-league Birmingham Barons.

Which team did Michael Jordan play for when he came out of retirement a second time, from 2001 to 2003?

Washington Wizards. Jordan had been running the team as its president of basketball operations, and gave up that job and his ownership stake in order to play.

Which heavyweight champion retired undefeated in 1956 after 49 professional fights?

Rocky Marciano. He walked away at 32 while still champion and never fought professionally again; 43 of his 49 wins came by knockout.

Which amateur golfer retired from competition at 28, months after winning the 1930 Grand Slam?

Bobby Jones. He never turned professional, earning his living as a lawyer, and after quitting competition he founded Augusta National and co-founded the Masters.

Cal Ripken Jr. retired in 2001 holding the consecutive-games record he took from which player?

Lou Gehrig. His run of 2,130 games ended only when he took himself out of the lineup, weakened by the disease that now carries his name.

Which Tonight Show host retired in 1992 after 30 years?

Johnny Carson. An estimated 50 million people watched his farewell; NBC handed the desk to Jay Leno, and David Letterman was soon competing against it on a rival network.

Which broadcaster, the first woman to co-anchor a US network evening newscast, retired in 2014?

Barbara Walters. She helped create The View at 67, an age when many broadcasters have already retired, and stayed on its panel until she was 84.

Which pope resigned in 2013, the first to do so in almost 600 years?

Benedict XVI. The previous pope to step down, Gregory XII in 1415, quit to help end a schism between rival popes; Benedict said his strength was failing.

During a break from acting in the late 1990s, Daniel Day-Lewis apprenticed in which trade in Italy?

Shoemaking. He learned the craft in Florence during a three-year absence from the screen, until Martin Scorsese drew him back for Gangs of New York.

Which quarterback retired in 2011 holding the NFL career records for both touchdown passes and interceptions?

Brett Favre. It was his third farewell: he had announced his retirement in 2008 and again in 2009, and both times was playing again within months.

Toy merchant Edwin Lowe popularised modern bingo after seeing what game at a 1929 carnival?

Beano. Players covered their numbers with dried beans; one story has an excited winner blurting out 'Bingo!' instead, though the word's origin is uncertain.

Which tennis champion ended his career in 2022 by playing doubles alongside his great rival Rafael Nadal?

Roger Federer. Repeated knee problems forced the decision; he chose the Laver Cup in London for his goodbye, and the two old rivals lost the match.

Which motorhome brand shares its name with the Iowa county where it began making travel trailers?

Winnebago. Five local businessmen bought the shut travel-trailer plant and later gave the business their county's name.

Which former US president spent more than 30 years of his retirement building homes with Habitat for Humanity?

Jimmy Carter. In 2019, aged 95, he arrived at a Nashville build with a black eye and 14 stitches, hours after a fall at home.

Which country legislated in 2025 to raise its retirement age to 70 by 2040?

Denmark. Since 2006 it has tied its pension age to life expectancy and revised it every five years; the May 2025 law lifts it from 67 to 70 for everyone born after 1970.

Which singer announced his retirement in 1971 at 55, only to return to the stage two years later?

Frank Sinatra. He had complained that nobody was writing songs for him any more; the comeback album played on his nickname, Ol' Blue Eyes Is Back.

Which quarterback announced his retirement in February 2022, then reversed the decision just 40 days later?

Tom Brady. He played one more season with Tampa Bay, then retired again a year to the day after the first announcement, this time adding the words 'for good'.

Shuffleboard moved from ship decks to dry land around 1913 at which Atlantic-coast Florida resort?

Daytona Beach. Passengers had been playing it on ocean liners; once a court was laid on land, the game swept through Florida and became a fixture of retirement communities.

Shuffleboard's '10 off' penalty zone shares which nickname with the no-volley zone in pickleball?

Kitchen is the name on both courts: in shuffleboard it costs a player ten points for each disc left in it, so rivals try to knock each other's discs in, while in pickleball it is the strip by the net where volleys are banned.

Which Florida city is home to the shuffleboard club, opened in 1924, that bills itself as the world's largest?

St. Petersburg's club grew to 110 courts, and it was there that the rules of the modern game were standardised, making the city the centre of the shuffleboard world.

Which name do American bingo halls give a game won only by covering every square?

Blackout, also called a coverall, is the typical jackpot game and often the last of a session: the big prize is paid only if a card is filled within a set number of calls, so it can build from one session to the next.

Which institutions adopted bingo as a fundraiser, sending its popularity soaring in the Great Depression?

Catholic churches caught on after a priest from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, brought Edwin Lowe his parish's money troubles; Lowe then had mathematician Carl Leffler devise 6,000 different cards so a whole hall could play.

Which Italian screen legend joined the cast of the 1995 sequel Grumpier Old Men?

Sophia Loren plays Maria, a five-times-married newcomer who buys the town's beloved bait shop to turn it into an Italian restaurant, starting a feud that ends with her marrying Max.