An Evening with Mo Rocca

Due to high demand, An Evening with Mo Rocca: ROCTOGENARIANS event tickets are now sold out. For updates on future events, please sign up for our e-newsletter. Thank you for your interest!

Join us for an after-hours event and Q&A in Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation with beloved CBS Sunday Morning correspondent and host of The Henry Ford's Innovation Nation, Mo Rocca, as he shares accounts from his new book, ROCTOGENARIANS: Late in Life Debuts, Comebacks, and Triumphs, an inspiring collection of stories celebrating the triumphs of people who made their biggest marks late in life.

Guests of the discussion will also have the opportunity to meet and take a picture with Mo Rocca.

The event will be moderated by Huel Perkins, retired and beloved news anchor from Fox 2 Detroit.

A cash bar with non-alcoholic/alcoholic refreshments and light snacks will be open during the course of the event.

*Price includes after-hours admission to the event and Q&A.

Ticket purchasers can add a signed copy of ROCTOGENARIANS: Late in Life Debuts, Comebacks, and Triumphs during the online purchase process or via the Contact Center at (313) 982-6001 for a discounted advance rate of $20 to be picked up at the event only.

Signed copies of the book will also be available to purchase onsite during the event for the retail price of $28.99.

About the Book

ROCTOGENARIANS: Late in Life Debuts, Comebacks, and Triumphs

Eighty has been the new sixty for about twenty years now. In fact, there have always been late-in-life achievers, those who declined to go into decline just because they were eligible for social security. Journalist, humorist, and history buff Mo Rocca and coauthor Jonathan Greenberg introduce us to the people past and present who peaked when they could have been puttering — breaking out as writers, selling out concert halls, attempting to set land-speed records — and in the case of one ninety-year tortoise, becoming a first-time father. (Take that, Al Pacino!)

In the vein of Mobituaries, ROCTOGENARIANS is a collection of entertaining and unexpected profiles of these unretired titans—some long gone (a cancer-stricken Henri Matisse, who began work on his celebrated cut-outs when he could no longer paint), some very much still living (Mel Brooks, yukking it up at close to one hundred). The amazing cast of characters also includes Mary Church Terrell, who at eighty-six helped lead sit-ins at segregated Washington, DC, lunch counters in the 1950s, and Carol Channing, who married the love of her life at eighty-two. Then there's Peter Mark Roget, who began working on his thesaurus in his twenties and completed it at seventy-three (because sometimes finding the right word takes time).

With passion and wonder Rocca and Greenberg recount the stories of yesterday's and today's strongest finishers. Because with all due respect to the Golden Girls, some people will never be content sitting out on the lanai. (PS Actress Estelle Getty was sixty-two when she got her big break. And yes, she's in the book.)

About Mo Rocca

Mo Rocca is a correspondent for CBS Sunday Morning, host of the hit Mobituaries podcast, and host of The Henry Ford's Innovation Nation. He's also a frequent panelist on NPR's hit weekly quiz show Wait Wait…Don't Tell Me! and host and creator of Cooking Channel's My Grandmother's Ravioli. Rocca is coauthor of the New York Times bestselling Mobituaries: Great Lives Worth Reliving and author of All the Presidents' Pets: The Story of One Reporter Who Refused to Roll Over.

About Huel Perkins

After a four-decade career in broadcasting and more than 32 years living in Detroit, Huel Perkins retired from Detroit's Fox 2 News in 2022. Huel is a three-time Emmy award winner who is equally committed to charitable work off-camera with more than 60 civic and charitable organizations having recognized him for his lifelong commitment to education, fundraising and financial empowerment. During his illustrious broadcast career, Huel traveled the country with Nelson Mandela, followed Pope John Paul II on his visit across America, and interviewed countless civil rights icons, politicians and business leaders. In retirement, he continues to devote his time to his local community.