Here is a bit of trivial history for Brattleboro. I find this to be an interesting fact I learned about when searching the internet for historical events of Brattleboro Vermont. This is a direct quote from the Social Security Website. The link is offered below. The only credit I can receive is sharing this with you here on ibrattleboro.
“The First Social Security Beneficiary
Ida May Fuller was the first beneficiary of recurring monthly Social Security payments. Miss Fuller (known as Aunt Ida to her friends and family) was born on September 6, 1874 on a farm outside of Ludlow, Vermont. She attended school in Rutland, Vermont where one of her classmates was Calvin Coolidge. In 1905, after working as a school teacher, she became a legal secretary.
One of the partners in the firm, John G. Sargent, would later become Attorney General in the Coolidge Administration.
Ida May never married and had no children. She lived alone most of her life, but spent eight years near the end of her life living with her niece, Hazel Perkins, and her family in Brattleboro, Vermont.
Miss Fuller filed her retirement claim on November 4, 1939, having worked under Social Security for a little short of three years. While running an errand she dropped by the Rutland Social Security office to ask about possible benefits. She would later observe: “It wasn’t that I expected anything, mind you, but I knew I’d been paying for something called Social Security and I wanted to ask the people in Rutland about it.”
Her claim was taken by Claims Clerk, Elizabeth Corcoran Burke, and transmitted to the Claims Division in Washington, D.C. for adjudication. The case was adjudicated and reviewed and sent to the Treasury Department for payment in January 1940. The claims were grouped in batches of 1,000 and a Certification List for each batch was sent to Treasury. Miss Fuller’s claim was the first one on the first Certification List and so the first Social Security check, check number 00-000-001, was issued to Ida May Fuller in the amount of $22.54 and dated January 31, 1940.”
http://www.ssa.gov/history/imf.html
Inflation
That would be $22.54 a month, a check expected to help cover the costs of living for a month for Ida. It probably did.
$22 gets you a meal or two these days.
I wonder if there is a copy of the check with that number on it. And what’s the number on the current checks going out?
I'm sure you will like this
I’m sure you will like this bit of information I found on the linked site below.
” By the time of her death, Fuller had collected $22,888.92 from Social Security monthly benefits, compared to her contributions of $24.75 to the system.”
This was a great return on her investment into the social security system. I do hope that one day my investment into the social security system will at least be equal to what I have been paying into it.
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=Fuller&GSiman=1&GScty=157011&GRid=57805311&
Ida May
Photo of Ida May with her first check, sent in by Stevil.
Wow
History in the making. I tried to find her grave site last year it is not 100% clear as to where she was buried. It is a mystery I look forward to solve over the warm months. I shall share a picture once I find the site and grave marker.
Thank you for this picture Stevil, where did you find it?
Ok, I just found the site
Ok, I just found the site with her photograph you shared here as well as the cemetery. Now I have a place to take a walk at today. I did not look at this cemetery yet, which explains not finding her grave stone.