History
Mensa was founded in Oxford, England, in 1946 by Roland Berrill and Lancelot Lionel Ware. Berrill was an Australian expatriate licensed to practice law. The founding of American Mensa took place on Sept. 30, 1960, at the Brooklyn home of Peter and Ines Sturgeon. Four other members attended. By 1963, the organization had grown to 1,000 members. By its 50th anniversary, American Mensa had approximately 58,000 members, and its headquarters moved from Brooklyn, New York, to Arlington, Texas.
Specialties
With more than 57,000 members, American Mensa is the largest national Mensa operating under the auspices of Mensa International, Ltd. There are currently more than 100,000 members worldwide, and an estimated six million Americans are eligible for Mensa membership. Members of American Mensa range in age from 2 to 102. They include engineers, homemakers, teachers, actors, athletes, students and CEOs, and they share only one trait -- high intelligence. To qualify for Mensa, they scored in the top 2 percent of the general population on an accepted standardized intelligence test.