THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, March 10, 1996 TAG: 9603080229
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Ida Kay's Portsmouth
SOURCE: Ida Kay Jordan
LENGTH: Medium: 82 lines
Hats and white gloves. Lime sherbet and ginger ale punch. A lot of hard work and no pay.
It was fun! Hard to believe, isn't it?
Members of the Portsmouth Junior Woman's Club - and sister clubs across the country - really did think they were having fun. To celebrate those good old days, the Portsmouth alumnae are planning a big reunion of women who were members from 1950 through 1975. However, if you were a member before or after those years, you're invited to join the celebration - just be sure you find your white gloves.
About a dozen of the once-junior women have been getting together to plan a May 5 tea at the Portsmouth Woman's Club on Sycamore Road.
They'll polish up the silver service and take turns pouring tea. They'll eat chicken salad and water cress, nuts and mints. They'll show off their hats of another time, hats that have been stashed in attics around town, and maybe some spike heels. They'll dig out pictures and newspaper clippings from local newspapers.
Most of all, they'll remember a time when it was not only ``fashionable'' but fun to work for the community good.
The scrapbooks they brought to their planning meeting last week were four and five inches thick for each year. The books tell the story of hard-working young women who made major contributions to the health and welfare of this city.
The Portsmouth club was organized in 1933 with 33 members. Hattie Query Esleeck was the first president. Within a few years, the membership grew to 100 young women, ages 18-35. And by 1950, when E. Ann Parker Stokes was president, the membership had increased to 150 with a waiting list.
Back in those days, it was not unusual to have demand exceed the limit on the size of the club. The permitted number of members was related to the population of the city and was decreed by the Federation of Women's Clubs.
The regional Suicide/Crisis Center, which has been operating and expanding since 1968, was started by the club.
In the years when polio was a big threat, the club more than did its part. The women took over the March of Dimes and raised large amounts of money. For instance, in 1952, they raised $30,000 for their polio project, much of it from the fabled annual Junior Woman's Club Follies. The club also sponsored free polio vaccination clinics.
Stokes said she remembers that the polio project was started by Donna Wood in the 1940s.
The club always did a lot of education projects, monitored School Board meetings and for a while offered scholarships to Portsmouth students. One of their particular interests was lobbying for kindergartens in the public schools.
They did many smaller projects such as buying a television set in the early 1950s for patients at Eastern State Mental Hospital in Williamsburg.
Another long-term interest was the Emily Green Home for elderly persons.
The big fiasco of their history was the proposed International Friendship Zoo at City Park. The club raised $10,000 and the city spent it on holes and concrete in the park.
``But the zoo never happened,'' Shirley Richards said. ``The City Council just decided not to do it. But we never got our money back!''
Looking back over their accomplishments, the women understandably were proud.
Many of the juniors of the 1950s and '60s didn't work for a paycheck, so they had some time to work for free. But even the rest of us, including those who worked on newspapers, felt compelled to do some of that free work.
In Elizabeth City and in Raleigh, where I was a Junior Woman, the meetings were a fashion parade for most people. But underneath the clothes, the women were serious about their community projects. Everywhere there was a club, there were women accomplishing big things for the community.
Alas, the Junior Woman's Club now is a thing of the past for most communities - even Portsmouth where traditions don't die easily. As a result, most places have a real shortage of young volunteers.
The post-Juniors are still going strong.
However, they definitely intend to enjoy their May gathering. When someone suggested each person could make a plate of party food, Mary Johnson got a lot of support when she declared: ``We don't want to do anything except be there with our hats and gloves!'' by CNB