
DATE: Thursday, May 1, 1997                 TAG: 9704300190

SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN             PAGE: 06   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: COVER STORY 

SOURCE: BY JOHN-HENRY DOUCETTE, CORRESPONDENT 

                                            LENGTH:  119 lines

OPEN HEART OPERATION TWO SUFFOLK ROTARY CLUBS JOIN FORCES WITH VOLUNTEERS AND BUSINESS TO FIX UP TWO HOMES FOR ELDERLY WIDOWS WHO ARE PHYSICALLY AND FINANCIALLY UNABLE TO DO THE WORK THEMSELVES.

Mary Jane Massenburg said she is happy because some men and women she doesn't know came to her house and painted it, and even cleaned up a little outside.

And she supposed, if she'd gotten to doing it herself, she would have paid a lot of money. She had the roof redone last year. It cost an arm and a leg.

Sitting in a flowered dress in her living room with an old movie playing on the television, she said she was happy. Her living room has newspaper on the floor, like a rug, and piles of things here and there.

The house is heated by oil, which sits in a tank in the backyard behind a freshly painted wall. The volunteers from the Suffolk Rotary Club did not paint a worn shed that rests in her back yard. Inside the house, there is a cage full of crickets in the hallway.

She is doing the best she can to keep her house, she said. She can't live anywhere else. Not the way rent is now.

The Massenburg home was one of two Suffolk homes cleaned up by volunteers participating in the Paint Your Heart Out Hampton Roads project on April 26. The project which which helped about 60 low-income homeowners from through South Hampton Roads put a new face on their houses and landscapes.

In Suffolk, over 50 volunteers from the local Rotary clubs which sponsored the event, rallied after an early breakfast from McDonald's, and set off to help people in their community who can no longer do home improvements themselves.

The project was part of a five-city clean-up campaign which grew from Paint Your Heart Out Chesapeake, a 1991 one-day cleanup. That cleanup was patterned after a similar service project in Tampa, Fla.

To benefit from the program, an applicant must be 62 or older and have combined income of less than $12,000. Applications from handicapped homeowners are also considered.

``The southside clubs got together,'' said Bob Moore, president of the North Suffolk Rotary Club. ``It sort of spread from there, and this is the first house we did ever for the program.''

Moore was referring to the home of Lucille H. Hatton, who is widowed. Last weekend, members of the North Suffolk Rotary Club wrapped up a project that was so consuming they had started it days before the actual clean-up date.

Doug Foust, 58, gave the guided tour of their work. ``We did the roof. And new gutters on the back. New Shutters. We primed it and painted it.''

Before that, ``it looked pretty rough,'' said Foust, a member of the North Suffolk club. ``It looks a heck of a lot better than when it started.''

Working on the old house that has a tin roof, the men scraped and painted the place. They spent lots of time on the roof. The tin was coated with aluminum paint.

The work crew also power-washed the home, which is sort of like sand-blasting using water instead of abrasive material. Foust said that took off all the paint.

Other men replaced straw in the woman's garden and did minor yard work.

``You wouldn't know this place compared to how we started,'' said Frank A. Schwalenberg, 74, as he stood with Hatton's 35-year-old son, William C. Hatton. The widow's grandchildren, Aleisha K. Hatton, 8, and Kanitra L. Hatton, 2, played as the Rotarians cleaned up.

``It looks wonderful,'' said William Hatton. ``It was kind of rusting out on us, especially with being on her own.''

He added that he and two brothers have been by to work on the house, but could never have mounted an effort equivalent to the sheer amount of people the Roatarians unleashed on the home.

The Rotarians had things wrapped up by noon on a warm day and cooled themselves under shady trees which populate Hatton's yard. The homeowner and volunteers ate donated pizzas from Chanello's and drank donated sodas from Farm Fresh when the work was done.

Hatton, who was born in Isle Wright, was glad to see the work done.

``I'm so happy I feel like crying,'' she said. ``I feel overjoyed. No way with me being a widow; there ain't no way I could have got it done.''

Hatton moved to the house with her husband in 1950. Burt Hatton worked in the Navy Yard. He passed away in 1994. They have seven children and all live in Virginia. The house will be a sight when the children make their next visit.

``They really did a good job,'' said Hatton. ``I'll tell you that.''

Club members said they hope to do more homes next year.

Massenburg, 67, is weathering hard times, just trying to keep her home, which she shares with one of her two daughters.

Showing off the fresh paint which makes the outside of her home look new, she said, ``I really appreciate that they thought that much of me to paint my house because I never heard of `Paint Your Hear Out.' ''

She moved to the small house, on a block of similar homes along Crittenden Road, in 1962 with her husband. Douglas Clarence Massenburg, who worked for Planters Peanuts, took sick in 1963. He passed away in 1968. She is barely getting by on Social Security benefits.

``I don't even get $500 a month.'' she said. ``After paying for insurance, and oil, and all of that, and trying to have me a little food in the house, I need to have a little more than that,'' she said.

Her daughter, she said, gives her what she earns as a waitress, but that isn't so much, either.

Not long ago, a man from the Rotary came to her home and asked if he could paint her house. She asked how much they would charge. He said it wouldn't cost a thing. She agreed.

``I'm very happy,'' she said, after the Rotary volunteers had left her life. ``Yes I am. Now I can save on getting my insides up.'' ILLUSTRATION: Cover color photo by GARY C. KNAPP

Tim Wright, left, of Chesapeake, guides a compressor hose for house

painter Clutch Cloverdale of Chesapeake, while Carter McDowell of

Virginia Beach steadies the ladder. The trio was part of an army of

volunteers participating in the ``Paint Your Heart Out Hampton

Roads'' project on April 26.

Photos by JOHN-HENRY DOUCETTE

Mary Jane Massenburg, whose home was painted by members of the

Suffolk Rotary Club, says she's ``very happy . . . Now I can save

on getting my insides up.''

Members of the North Suffolk Rotary Club's Paint Your Heart Out crew

do yard work at the home of Lucille H. Hatton, who is widowed.

Homeowner Lucille H. Hatton talks with members of the North Suffolk