you may think that because mrs. joan kroc was so incredibly generous and left the npr endowment over 200 million dollars that your membership is not needed or appreciated. but, that's just not true. her money goes into a the bank and the interest of the endowment is what will keeping all the spiffy quality program on the air and help develop new programming.

this is all interesting, you say, "but what does this mean to me?" well, this means that you still have the opportunity to be generous to your local public radio station. (mrs. kroc's interest in her local public radio station is what got her interested in supporting national public radio, you know!) they deliver your daily programming and they still depend on contributions from members like me to buy the programs, to hire the employees, to pay the bills an to purchase everything from paperclips to satellite dishes. even if you don't have 200 million dollars to donate, every little bit of our generosity is needed and is sincerely appreciated. (if your budget is a little tight, why not donate something even more valuable than cash - donate your time! your public radio station always needs volunteers, you know!)

now, what i want to know is, what did mrs. kroc's estate get as a member incentive? millions of npr coffee mugs? carl kassel recording a message on their answering machine? a tub of mama stamberg's cranberry relish?

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