Bellows Falls Woman’s Club still going strong

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Since 1901, the Bellows Falls Woman’s Club has been a presence in the community for doing projects that make things better in many ways.

The group numbers 56 active members, who do various projects all over town and all through the year. Lovell’s history of Rockingham notes that the organization had 111 members when it began in 1901 and 200 in 1957.

“I am very amazed at the number of hours we put in this year,” President Dianne Potter said.

Treasurer Ruth Keefe says the projects raise between $3,000 and $3,500 a year.

The money it is donated to different causes. Recently, $300 was given for Puerto Rican hurricane relief through the American Mothers organization. And last year, members held their first High Tea to raise funds for their scholarship fund.

Members describe the tea as a “huge success.”

Vice President Betty Haggerty said it was “well received and high class.”

“It was an hour of Heaven,” board member Barbara Comtois said.

Members say people are already asking when they will do it again this year. Their oldest living member is Alice Powers, who is over 100 and has been a member for 73 years. She is now one of the five honorary members.

Haggerty has been a member since 1986. Pins were recently given to Nita Kimball for 35 years service and to Rose Werden for 40.

Even the longest-serving members now don’t go back to the time when the organization held its meetings in some of the big Victorian houses of Bellows Falls. For a long time, the club met in what is now the Lower Theater in the Rockingham Town Hall. That room was designated the “Woman’s Club Room” and it is still called that by many locals today.

Keefe says she worked at the Bellows Falls Trust bank, now People’s United Bank, on the Square and she became interested in joining after having watched all the ladies coming and going from their meetings in the town hall next door.

She also says that since retiring, club events have been a great way to keep in touch with her former customers and co-workers.

When the Bellows Falls club was formed, it joined the State Federation of Women’s Clubs and then the General Federation of Women’s Clubs in 1913. Part of the current $30 yearly dues goes to the Federation and is used for projects on a national level.

Early on, the Woman’s Club was involved in starting a visiting nurse program and a 12-bed hospital in Bellows Falls.

Amy Frizzell Searles was the first district nurse in 1904, and now the club has an annual scholarship fund named after her that is awarded to a high school senior who is headed toward a medical career. Last year’s recipient was Brooke James, who is currently taking courses at CCV.

The club has numerous other community service projects that fund its scholarship and many donations. One is a bi-annual community project. This past year, members helped toward the Rockingham Free Public Library’s purchase of Jerry Pfohl’s spectacular painting of the Vilas Bridge.

They will be selling prints of the painting to fund a bench outside the health center.

With another project, members helped restore the library’s 120-year-old grandfather’s clock which was previously donated by the club.

Some projects are not fundraisers but are “hands-on work,” like tending the shrubbery in front of the Middle School, flower beds at the Rec Center where, years ago, they established the playground.

The club’s projects are diverse.

“We don’t just have these pet projects,” Keefe said.

Other projects include providing trash cans at the Waypoint Center, running a food and bake sale at the Walpole Library Book Sale, decorating the lobby of the Health Center, contributing to the downtown Christmas lights, assisting at the holiday “shopping mall” at Central Elementary where members help the students wrap presents, and a student art show at the high school that includes a luncheon and music presented by students.

“These folks are so talented,” Comtois said of the students.

“It’s amazing what they do,” Potter said.

Prospective members are allowed to attend two meetings then decide if they want to pay their dues and join. If they join, they are assigned to a committee and “put to work” on one of the club’s projects.

“If you don’t want to be a giver, you don’t fit,” Comtois said.

“It’s a group of people who know how to work with people,” Potter said.

Evelyn Weeks echoed that sentiment, saying, “they’ve got to be team players.”

Weeks mother, Jo Jones, who came to Bellows Falls from Massachusetts in the 1970s, brought a list of rules from a similar group there. Those rules have been in the Membership Book for Bellows Falls ever since.

Besides maintaining tradition, the club has modernized. It has a website, https://bellowsfallswomansclub.weebly.com and a Facebook page. The organization meets the second Tuesday of the month from September through May at the United Church in Bellows Falls. Anyone interested in attending a meeting to consider signing on can contact Barbara Comtois at (802) 344-0025.