I know many of the readers here are focused on the future and especially the RCSC's board meetings in January of 2022; i am one of those who looks to the past to see the future. Over the years i have come to understand, there's little that's new, most everything is just repackaged and done again and again. For the next couple of days, i will take the time to talk in terms of the summer of 1959 and walk us forward. For those who think history is boring, close the thread now and save yourself the agony of enduring the Sun City story. Seriously, i get it, why care about what happened? How we were built? Why we were successful? The answer of course is because the answers to the coming challenges have all been dealt with before. However, we are getting ahead of ourselves. Not at all unusual for boomers who want what they want when they want it. I loved the old analogies; we (boomers) grew up in an era when we saw everything happen in the space of an hour long television show and we began to assume that was the way life was supposed to be. The greatest generation lived through radio programs where the journey carried on week to week. It's Easy To Build Houses; It's Hard To Build A Community: Del Webb was master builder, his partner, Jim Boswell was a wealthy cotton grower who owned two 10,000 acre parcels of land in Arizona. After watching the semi-successful creation of Youngtown in 1954, Webb and Boswell formed a partnership in the summer of 1959. The Del E Webb Development Corporation (DEVCO) was formed with Webb hold 51% and Boswell having 49%. In July of that year they began scratching out the front 9 holes of the North golf course. On Sept 1 of 1959, they started building the community that would change a nation. Located on the corner of Grand Ave and 107th Ave, heading south, they built in 4 short months the following: A shopping center; the Hiway House Motor Inn, complete with bar and restaurant; a recreation center called Community Center (Oakmont); the pro shop for the front 9 holes of the golf course that was open; 5 model homes ranging in size from just under 900 sq. feet to the largest just over 1300 square; and a gas station that would open soon after. Together, Webb and Boswell kicked in 1.2 million dollars to get the project up and running. $600K in cash from Boswell, and 600k in in-kind labor. it was an enormous risk but one they felt had promise. There was no blueprint for an active adult community like this anywhere in the country. Both Del and Jim were visionaries to the extent they saw the potential for the growing number of retirees to want more than the proverbial rocking chair after their working years. I will end here for now, but stop and think about this one: 1.2 million dollars to start "The Community That Changed The Nation," compared to 4 million dollars to replace the golf storage building to house the golf equipment at Lakes East/West. Hmmmmm!
Actually 4 million is cheap based on the inflation rate, but don't tell Bill Cook! Value of $4,000,000 from 1959 to 2022 $4,000,000 in 1959 is equivalent in purchasing power to about $38,205,910.65 today, an increase of $34,205,910.65 over 63 years. The dollar had an average inflation rate of 3.65% per year between 1959 and today, producing a cumulative price increase of 855.15%. This means that today's prices are 9.55 times higher than average prices since 1959, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics consumer price index. A dollar today only buys 10.47% of what it could buy back then. The inflation rate in 1959 was 0.69%. The current year-over-year inflation rate (2021 to 2022) is now 6.81%. If this number holds, $4,000,000 today will be equivalent in buying power to $4,272,360.11 next year. The current inflation rate page gives more detail on the latest inflation rates. (Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI)
Golf course storage building aside, the reality is 62 years ago today saw the someof the guys behind Sun City wrap up their final touches as they approached the terrifying opening scheduled for New Years Day. They finished late New Years Eve and Tom Breen, Owen Childress, John Meeker and Jack Ford gathered at Manuel's Place in Peoria and had a cocktail. Their efforts to get it done had been nothing short of Herculean. They had spent a boatload of money on advertising, had bill boards spread across Phoenix and now all that was left was an empty feeling of "would anyone come?" Childress was the financial guy and he asked an even more depressing question; "how am i going to get 30 year financing for a 62 year old guy?' The challenges seemed almost insurmountable. Imagine: the middle of nowhere and the desert to boot; only selling to a small segment of the buying public (50 and over); land scams were everywhere; there was nothing like it anywhere in the country; they had literally no blue print on what it would look like or become. For lessor men. it would have been daunting. But these were Del Webb's finest. They were guys who had taken on life's biggest building challenges and won, time and time again. Webb and company had no quit in them, saw every challenge as an opportunity and loved the rush of what was to come. Everyone has doubts, we all wonder, can it be done? The simple truth is, you do the best you can and then accept the outcomes. They had planned and shaped and shared an idea that Sun City would fill a void that existed in the country. With the passage of Taft Hartley in 1948, defined benefit pension plans and employer paid health care would pave the way for earlier retirements and disposable income. The idea average working women and men would be looking for something more than the proverbial rocking chair certainly sounded appealing. With that in mind the built a community that offered more than what they had back home. It was different and different isn't always better. Hence the anxiety that shrouded them that New Year's Eve 62 year's ago. I get excited with every turn of the calendar. As much as i find Christmas a downer, i find New Year's an upper. I suspect the anxiety they felt the night before the opening was just the tip of the emotional roller coaster. The anticipation for the opening, all of their hard work, their planning and their vision had to be a stimulant that fired their desire to succeed. They had convinced Del Webb and Jim Boswell to invest a lot of money in an idea, a concept that was never before tried. Would it pan out? Would it pay off? Was it sheer craziness or pure genius? 62 years later, we know the answer. However, knowing the answer is wholly different from knowing the history behind that answer. My goal here is to help each of you know, appreciate it and then be willing to fight to preserve it. Intriguing eh?
My dad was an engineer on the Burlington Northern Railroad; mom was a housewife who tried her hand at selling Mary Kay cosmetics and Park Lane jewelry. There were 5 kids, one graduated from college; not me. Suffice to say, we were an average family of average means. Not poor and certainly not rich. Dad retired a touch early from the railroad after a collision with a coal truck on the tracks. The good news was, no one died, the coal truck was smashed to smithereens. The folks sold the bigger house they owned and moved into a town house in a suburb of St Paul Minnesota. Life in the town house was boring because the cost to do anything was expensive. On top of that, the cold had taken it's toll on them and they tried a winter get-a-way to Lake Havasu in a rental. It was the mid 90's and they enjoyed their time there, and bought a lot to build on some day. The third year there, they drove to Sun City AZ to see some high school friends who had retired there. They spent a week with them and dad came home and announced they were selling everything and moving to Sun City. It was startling as it usually took dad 6 weeks to decide on what coat and tie to buy. They sold the town house, sold the lot in Havasu and packed up a you-haul and towed the car with their belongings. The relatives thought it was scandalous they were leaving their kids and grand kids behind. They were in their early 60's and people just didn't do that (according to my aunts and uncles). It took me three years to visit them. I didn't want to be around a bunch of "old people." We did talk regularly on the phone and it was clear, they had never been happier. They were busy all the time and the cost to do all the things they were doing easily fit in their retirement budget. I finally broke down three years later and came out to see where and what they had moved to. My wife didn't come. When i called her my first full day here, i told her this was where we were going to live; she laughed at me. She came back the next month for a visit and it was love at first sight for her as well. Sun City was that spectacular. A couple of years later we bought our first house, we were 51, so we rented it out during the winters to cover our costs. It was the smartest thing we ever did with a dollar. At 55 we both retired and came to our place in the sun. It was always the plan, at least once we found Sun City AZ. We thought we would be in Florida, somewhere, most likely Fort Lauderdale. Once we saw Sun City, that notion was quickly cast aside. Beside, being here as my parents aged was the perfect solution. I had the good fortune to hold both of them as they died years later. So, why does any of this matter? It's pretty simple. During my years with the Museum, i have read countless personal stories and pretty much all of them are the same as mine. Average men and women of average means retire and are bored to tears. Somehow, they stumble across Sun City and their lives are transformed. There's a renewed bounce in their step. They can afford to do things they could never afford to do at home. They became involved in clubs and organizations and every day is filled with as much as they want there to be. Opportunities are endless; it was that way from the start and still is that way today. An old co-presenter from my days with International Foundation of Employee Benefits wrote a book called Viable Utopian Ideas. It was just one of many Art Shostak did, and i always thought Sun City should have been one of the stories in the book. There were all kinds of scenarios for a better way of life, but he missed our story. Too bad, because well over 100,000 people, perhaps closer to 200,00, seniors have been moving to Sun City and enjoying a way of life they had never expected to be able to live or more importantly, afford. On January 1, 1960 Sun City opened and while no one at the time knew or understood what it would become, we now know it became "The Community That Changed A Nation." Once you get your head around that, you begin to truly appreciate why our history is so important to all of us.
Loved your post on SC Facebook about fountains on Grand freezing and the sad post about the dance club disbanded years ago
The other day i stopped at the Bell Lawn Bowling club and after rolling bowls i was looking at the bulletin boards. Posted was a two page story on a bowler (Dick Macho) who had died last year that i played with when i first moved to Sun City. It was apparently written by his son who went into great detail about Dick's life as a musician back in Minnesota. He was a famous accordionist and in the state's music hall of fame. As i finished, it dawned on me, i never knew that. For the last 20 years, i almost always ask people how they got to/found Sun City. I've long been intrigued by the journey, for those who make Sun City their home, how they came to this community in the middle of the desert. The stories are almost always fascinating; not in a movie kind of epic way, but more from a human perspective. There's plenty of twists and turns, but in the end, they usually visited someone who lived here and fell in love with all it had to offer. From opening day in January of 1960, that has been the case. So you all know our history a little better, understand this, Sun City was originally built for low to moderate income retirees. The Youngtown model was even more affordable, but then they never offered any amenities. The average cost of a home in 1960 in the USA was $11,900. Sun City's home prices for the 5 models ranged from a low of $8500 to $13,000. If you wanted a golf course lot, it was another $1250, air conditioning was an additional $600. All in all, buying a home in Sun City was still a pretty good bargain. New home, great quality construction and virtually no taxes to speak of. The real value came with all of the amenities that were in place when buying into the community. In what proved to be a really bad mistake, DEVCO opened New Life Unit One with a voluntary payment of $20 per year to use Community Recreation Center. It was a mistake that would haunt them for the next 7 years. I suspect DEVCO assumed everyone would become members and help defray the cost of running the center. Boy, were they wrong. By year's end, even though sales were through the roof, those joining were just over 50%. That mistake was quickly adjusted and those buying the next year (1961) found what we all know as a "facilities agreement," was in place. By then the second rec center, Town Hall, was being built. It was much more elaborate and far fancier. The bigger deal was everyone buying in Sun City, after New Life Unit One, became members and paid a yearly fee, whether they used the centers or not. Interestingly enough, the pricing bounced all over the map with a high point of $40 per unit, down to $12 per person and finally settled into a more comfortable $20 per year, per household. Unfortunately those living around Community Center, held firm on not having to join/pay. Which tragically kept the community divided. They even established a name for it; the mini-Berlin wall. In most cases, those living in New Life Unit One were only allowed to use Community Center; and those not paying, weren't able to use any of them. The situation came to a head in 1967 when the plans were on the books to open Town Hall South (Mountainview). By then, Community Center had become dated and DEVCO agreed to update it if the residents voted on accepting a facilities agreement. A vote was taken and passed easily. The mini-Berlin wall came down and the community became one. Everybody had access to everything. It was a huge step forward for the company and community alike. All too often, people living here think Sun City opened and success was a given. That was hardly the case. In fact, in 1964, Webb let go the three employees most directly responsible for convincing him to build it. Tom Breen and Joe Ashton were fired and L.C. Jacobson was moved to Las Vegas and quit the company shortly thereafter. John Meeker was sent in to try and salvage the experiment we know as age restricted living. He had explicit orders to fix it, or Sun City would survive only south of Grand Ave. Those who doubt that only need look at Plan B for development north of Grand Ave in Meeker's journals. Those of us who have been kicking around the Museum and have become fixated on our story, we know just how spectacular the narrative is. We know the trials and tribulations. We know our success wasn't an accident, but the hard work of thousands who refused to let it fail. We know that ownership of the process is what made it all work and why it would be tragic to let it all slip through our hands and lose that piece of the history that made Sun City unique. It was never intended to be governance by a few, but by those interested and willing to become involved. Hopefully during 2022, we'll get a chance to hear your story and for you to better understand the roll you all can play as we move forward.
And when you think about it co-ownership and self-governance is really the only means of governance with any stability. One-third of the board changes every year so do we want our decisions decided by a board that brings a different point of view every year to every option or new project, or do you want decisions made by the community, people who are stable in their positions and have to live every day by the rules that they themselves may have implemented? Decisions made by a board that fluctuates every year doesn't seem to instill any confidence or stability that what was decided on last year won't be undone the following year! And the unintended consequences is that the new board members are most likely already in conflict with the old ones because that's most likely the reason they decided to run for the board! The old board will attempt to defend their positions while the new board members might have a difference of opinion?
