Almost twenty-five years ago, President James Miller, Adult Education Director James Nagel, and Trustee President Dr. Don Adams invited Instructor Louisa Strock to accompany them to a National Conference on Learning in Retirement at  Asheville, North Carolina.  The Conference was intended to introduce Ron Mannheim’s vision of expanded learning opportunities for older adults.

The  movement already begun by Elderhostel was suggested as probably the best of the new networks, and Mannheim believed that affiliation would give strength to the start-ups.  The divisions of Elderhostel had already been set: travel and learn, and stay home and learn.  One of the earliest in Ohio, The Center for Lifelong Learning offered area residents chances for both kinds of activities, and for eight years even hosted highly successful week-long studies of the Great Black Swamp for visitors from far-away states.

However, only a few residents of the NSCC Service Area were able to attend the national gatherings, and emphasis gradually shifted to the Institute.  Today, the CLL is one of more than three hundred self-governing links across the continent, mostly on two-year college campuses.  The coordinating Network office is at Elderhostel Headquarters in Boston, MA.  The Travel and Learn division also thrives, and has lately been re-christened “Road Scholar.”