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The Fraternal Order of Retired Border Patrol
Officers is its membership: the retired officers and other devoted personnel of the Immigration and Naturalization Service,
their wives, and their widows.
Following the mandatory
exodus of January 1, 1978, as the number of retirees continued to grow and scatter out across the country, it became evident
that the friendships and shared experiences of a quarter century were in jeopardy; the unique spirit and loyalties that we
had all known and taken for granted over the years might soon be eroded by time and distance. With our ties to INS severed,
it was recognized that we needed something to which we could belong: some focal principle that we could identify with. And
so we got together in Denver and there evolved what we now call FORBPO, an Order that is rapidly becoming one hell of an organization.
In late 1978, following an initial exchange of views and ideas, a group
of thirty-three of us, met in Denver, Colorado, and put together the original FORBPO charter, dated October 25,1978.
The founders in Denver wisely agreed that the Order would be exclusively
fraternal in concept and that its purpose would simply be to preserve the friendships and associations that might otherwise
be lost in retirement--with no commercial, political, or other controversial commitments to muddy the cause.
For the great majority of us, the Border Patrol was where it all started
: down along the river, or perched on some sandhill or a snowdrift out in the middle of nowhere; where you might have felt
the need for prayer, but you inevitably put your faith in a mortal: your partner: where friendships ran deep and lasting no
matter the path you might have chosen upon leaving the border. It is our belief that if we can perpetuate the spirit of those
early years, we shall have something that few others ever achieve in retirement.
As quoted from the minutes of the Charter Conference in Denver:
" And so they reached out in every direction to insure that all of those who had shared their feelings
and experiences in those early years would now be included in this new experience."
Most of you to whom this is addressed already have a vested interest of some two or three decades in
this endeavor, and now you can cap it all by joining us in FORBPO. We sincerely hope you will print out the application
found on this site and send it to the membership chairman. We'll be looking forward to seeing you at our Annual Conference
(Reunion) next spring.
Hasta Luego
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