Don Carlson was elected the first president and Dorothy Read was the first secretary of the Central Alberta Retired Teachers' Association (CARTA) and were very active in the association for many years. Dorothy Read also went on to become the president of ARTA in 1975.

An initial attempt to organize a retired teachers’ group in the Vermilion area could have died with the original organizer, Clarke Richardson, in 1974, but interest had been roused and the Central East Retired Teachers Association (CERTA) was founded on September 11, 1975.

In 1928 John W. Barnett parked his gray Dort in front of the Camrose Normal School and pitched his idea of a provincial teachers’ organization to principal William Stricker and the classes of teachers in training. The Alberta Teachers’ Association was formed as a result of the efforts of J. W. Barnett, and some of those teachers in training eventually joined the Camrose and District Retired Teachers’ Association.

In the late 1950s, the retired teachers of Edmonton met irregularly to address concerns regarding low pensions, medical insurance needs and hospital care. By the fall of 1960, the Retired Teachers of Edmonton was formally organized with Ben Hager acting as President and Lillian Parnell as the Secretary-Treasurer.

The St. Albert and Area Retired Teachers’ Association (STARTA) has grown from a small group of retired teachers sixteen years ago to a group of over 150 active members. We are proud of our enthusiastic and hard-working executive members, both past and present, and also of the many people behind the scenes who help make things happen in our branch.

The formation of HARTA took approximately six months to come to fruition, although the vision was present in November of 2009. Ron Thompson was one of a number of ARTA members who attended an organizational meeting to establish a branch of ARTA to serve the counties of Wetaskiwin, Leduc and Brazeau in November 2009.

Although the teachers of Parkland School Division have always been politically active and rather influential at the provincial level, it was not until 2007 that Irl Miller and Aileen Munro, retirees from Memorial Composite High School in Stony Plain, began to gather names and contact information of fellow retirees to charter a retired teachers’ organization in the area.

Formerly known as the Strathcona County Retired Teachers' Association (SCRTA), the top priority for EIRTA when it was formed in 1987 was recruitment. The first president, Ron Mundell , with his executive of Bud Baker, Doris Corbin and Ena Campbell, set out to gather together like-minded individuals with the three goals of sharing fellowship, improving member-welfare, and being actively involved in the group and in the community.

The Stettler and District Retired Teachers' Association (SDRTA) is one of the younger branches of ARTA. It took us some length of time to make up our minds about becoming a branch. In the early 2000s, retired teachers in our area had been courted by the Red Deer and Camrose branches to join their social functions, which some of us did. Eventually, Gerry Smith who was a former teacher in Stettler and, at that time, incumbent Executive Secretary of ARTA, encouraged us to form a branch.

The Ponoka Retired Teachers’ Association was organized in 1975 around the kitchen table of Viola Shomshor.  The first president was Twig Taylor.  Following the amalgamation of Ponoka and Lacombe county school boards in the 1990s the branch name changed to Ponoka & District Retired Teachers’ Association.  In 2013 the branch was renamed the Wolf Creek Retired Teachers’ Association to more accurately reflect and be inclusive of the current membership.

The Vermilion branch of ARTA received its charter in 1975, and a number of Wainwright area teachers attended its functions. On September 9, 1982, Nancy Ryall had a coffee party where the idea of forming their own branch was proposed. Twenty-five retired teachers attended an organizational meeting on December 9 in the Grace United Church hall. Elected to office were Marie Valleau (President), Washburn Laird (Vice-President), Nancy Ryall (Secretary-Treasurer) and Mildred Hughes (Program Convener).