A Trip to the Aid Association for Lutherans in Appleton Monday, August 31, 2009

In 1902, four men decided to form a life insurance company to serve the Lutheran population. Today the result is a Fortune 500 company that has over three million members. One of the founders is our ancestor Gottlieb Ziegler.

We visited the AAL (now called Thrivent) complex just off of N. Ballard and Apple Creek Roads to re-learn the history of the institution....

The main office building used to be in downtown Appleton. In 1977, AAL moved out to the country and built a new complex. In fact, some of the Ziegler descendants sold part of their land to help form the Thrivent compound.

The chapel from the downtown office, built in 1967 was moved in total out to the new building. In 2002, AAL merged with a similar service from Minnesota, Lutheran Brothers.

The cornerstones of the non-profit organization are that you must be Lutheran to join and they must sell life insurance. They give away millions of dollars per year to support charities, typically to the tune of $150M per year.