Momofuku Ando invented pot noodles, aged 61.

J.R.R. Tolkien published the first volume of Lord of The Rings, aged 61.

James Parkinson identified Parkinson’s disease, aged 62.

Rosa Branicka helped to develop pioneering surgical techniques for breast cancer by operating – on herself, aged 63.

Noah Webster completed his dictionary, aged 70.

Benjamin Franklin signed the Declaration of Independence, aged 70.

Charles Darwin was breaking new ground with The Power of Movement in Plants, aged 71.

Mary Wesley wrote The Camomile Lawn, aged 72.

Nelson Mandela was elected President of South Africa, aged 75.

Grandma Moses started painting aged 76.

John Glenn flew a space mission, aged 77.

Giuseppe Verdi's Falstaff premiered when he was 80.

Christopher Plummer won an Oscar, aged 82. Jessica Tandy, aged 80. Clint Eastwood, aged 74.

Mommsen received the literature Nobel, aged 85. Leonid Hurwicz for economics, aged 90.

Michelangelo designed the Santa Maria degli Angeli, aged 88.

Arthur Rubinstein, performed one of his most seminal recitals at Carnegie Hall, aged 89.

Chagall was exhibited at the Louvre, aged 90 - the first living artist to be so.

Priscilla Sitienei, a great-great-grandmother and former midwife in Kenya, started primary school, aged 91.

George Burns brought down the house in Schenectady, NY, 63 years after his debut there, aged 94.

Johanna Quaas has been training and competing in gymnastics since 1934. She is 95 and has been married to her coach for 57 years.

Vera Lynn was in the charts, aged 97.

Dr Leila Denmark was working as a paediatrician, aged 103.

Dagny Carlsson went to a computing class at the age of 99. She is one of Sweden's most prominent bloggers, aged 108.

These are the people you are being encouraged to think of as expendable. Nobody should decide when someone else's life's work is done.

Be respectful to older people. They are the keepers of a society's identity.