In Praise of Alphabet Soup May is Older Americans Month. Most years, this is an opportunity to celebrate the contributions of older adults make in our communities, as volunteers and civic leaders. 2025 was the year to celebrate milestones of programs that recognized and affirmed the contributions of older Americans and secured a degree of comfort and dignity for them... Read more
Comfort and Dignity Since its founding in 1908, the Benjamin Rose Institute has addressed the financial challenges faced by older adults. In its first two decades, Benjamin Rose provided modest monthly stipends to “worthy, older adults” to meet their living expenses when illness or misfortune threatened their ability to live with comfort and dignity. These payments, and the... Read more
A Bit of History for Women’s History Month Please indulge me in a bit of history about people, places and things. The “Thing”: “The first meeting of the Benjamin Rose Institute Board of Trustees was held on July 20, 1908 in the Directors Room of the Citizens Savings and Trust Company.” Benjamin Rose made his fortune in the meatpacking industry, and diversified his... Read more
Ribbon Cutting The average temperature in Cleveland in January is 35 degrees. It was a little colder than that on January 22. We went outside anyway. Just over two years ago, Benjamin Rose launched major renovations at Margaret Wagner House. This multi-million-dollar project included many upgrades to the 65-year-old building: a new roof, elevators and HVAC systems.... Read more
Driving Home According to AAA, nearly 80 million Americans travel over the Thanksgiving holiday. It is the busiest travel week of the year - more than Christmas or the Fourth of July. The vast majority of us travel by car. The good news is that gas prices are lower. The bad news is that there are more... Read more
Another Day Older. . . . . .and deeper in debt. Merle Travis wrote the song Sixteen Tons about the life of a coal miner in eastern Kentucky. He first recorded the song in 1946. Travis attributed the chorus’ “another day older and deeper in debt” to a letter from his brother about being a coal miner. Written nearly a... Read more
The Corner Drug Store Last month, the drug store in my neighborhood closed. As part of its bankruptcy and reorganization, Rite Aid closed 181 stores across Ohio. Fifteen of those stores were in Cuyahoga County, including the one that was within walking distance from my home. Walgreens recently announced it may close as many as 2,150 underperforming stores by 2027. CVS has also closed hundreds of stores in communities across the country. Industry analysts point to a variety of reasons for this: the entry of big-box stores into the industry, a trend toward consolidation and fewer independent operators, the expanded use of telemedicine and mail-order delivery of medications, and the rising influence of pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), all have contributed to the reduction in the number of neighborhood pharmacies across the country. Read more
A new GUIDE for Caregivers The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) estimates that dementia affects more than 6.7 million Americans. Many of those people have multiple chronic conditions, such as diabetes, heart disease or Parkinson’s. This may mean increased rates of hospitalization and fragmented care. Caring for a loved one can become complex and exhausting for the caregiver.... Read more
Summertime Summer days are long in Cleveland. Our northern latitude, and daylight savings time, mean that during June and July, daylight lingers past nine o-clock. For several weeks, I don’t need to turn on the lights in the kitchen while I make my morning coffee. And there is plenty of time for an evening walk before it gets dark. Read more
Volunteer Volunteering and volunteerism are integral to society and institutions in the United States. Alexis de Tocqueville noted in Democracy in America what he saw as a uniquely American bent toward establishing associations. “. . .as soon as several inhabitants have taken an opinion or an idea. . . they seek each other out and. .... Read more
