Archive: Around Town

The weather reports looked horrible.  Rain all day with a chance of thunderstorms.  And indeed it was raining on Tuesday morning. "We really count on this for our scholarship," said Lansing Lions Club President Linn Davidson around 9am that morning.  "It makes a big difference if we can have a real good day today."  By 11am when the Lion's 45th annual 4th of July Picnic was about to begin the rain had stopped.  Except for isolated drizzles, the weather held for the rest of the day including a few appearances by the sun.  All 1650 chicken halves had been sold before 3pm.

The Lansing Lions Club has donated several of the Myers Park pavilions to the Town, as well as the Community Center, trees and numerous other projects.  They were responsible, along with the Boy Scouts, for the flags you saw along 34 and 34B Tuesday, and contribute to numerous projects including scholarships, providing eyeglasses and hearing aids to Lansing seniors, sponsoring scouts and the Lansing Leos (the youth branch of the Lions), among many others.  "The opportunity to raise funds for the community is what we're all about here," Davidson says.  


On the menu were 1/4 and 1/4 chicken dinners and chicken without the dinner.  Dinners included chicken, salt potatoes, apple sauce, baked beans, cookies and a drink.  Seven or eight Lions arrived around 6:30 to set up the barbecue and start cooking the chicken.  The club uses Bob Baker's famous "Cornell Sauce" on their chicken.  "Every time we turn them we sauce them," says Lion Howard Longhouse.  "We sprinkle it on."  The first batch was done before 9 and placed in buckets to make room on the barbecues for more.  Meanwhile another crew cooked salt potatoes, while others set up the serving areas.


The club also raised funds with a cake wheel, a 50/50 raffle, and sales of brooms and Lansing Throws.  The throws are a blanket designed by Lions Membership Chair Noni Krom that depicts scenes from historic Lansing.  The proceeds from throw sales are being used exclusively for a band stand/gazebo to be built in Myers Park.  "We want to make sure it goes up by next Spring," says Krom.  "We have Music in the Park now, they can use it for weddings, they can use it for dances... It's going to be a big enough pavilion that the public can use it in many, many ways."


Krom says the Lions have raised between nine and ten thousand dollars toward the band stand so far.  "We've had different companies donate.  Anyone that gives over a $250 donation, their name will go on a plaque that will go on the band stand.  We have probably received about $3,000 in donations, plus we have applied for a grant of $3,000 through Lions International.  Plus we've sold probably about $4,000 worth of throws."


About 40 of the 52 Lansing Lions worked on the event, along with teens from the Leos and non-member volunteers.  Other groups also had tents and tables, including the Cub Scouts, the Lansing Historical Association, Lansing Community Council, the Lansing Community Library Center, the Lansing Star, and a variety of mostly local collectibles vendors in a flea market on the site.  Exhibitors were not charged, but could give a donation to the Lions if they chose.


So despite the heat, humidity, drizzle and threatening skies, an enormous crowd turned out to celebrate the 4th and support the Lions.  "We've got to count on a big community turn-out," Davidson said.  "We usually have it every year, but you always have the jitters when you start out."  By the time they finished, the jitters were gone and the Lions had concluded a very successful fund raiser.

----
v2i26