Around Town: The club with heart keeps ticking

It began with an e-mail from my friend Sue Tutt.

Sue reminded me that at 10 a.m. on Feb. 24, the La Cañada Thursday Club will present “Heart Healthy: A Workshop for Living Wisely.” The program will be open to the community.

The e-mail said, “It is the mission of the Thursday Club Community Relations Committee this year is to offer a variety of events to help educate the community and the Club membership on women’s health issues.”

Sue explained, “Most people think of heart disease as a man’s disease, yet heart disease is the number one killer of women in this country. I believe all women will benefit from this program.”

Sue is a past president of the Thursday Club. I served on her board. Her club year was noteworthy for many things, including Sue’s successful battle against cancer and her very public advocacy for regular mammograms and check ups.

Sue didn’t know it, but her approach falls squarely within the early tradition of the Thursday Club. The club motto is from Emerson: “Nothing great is accomplished without enthusiasm.” The organization was founded by thoughtful, civic-minded La Cañada women in 1912.

Local historian June Doughtery once told me that the decade between 1910 and 1920 was a period of growth in the La Cañada valley. The town of Montrose, connected by a streetcar line to downtown Los Angeles, was founded in 1913. The elementary school was built. Water began to be pumped with electric pumps. Our town began to change from a purely ranching community into something else.

Not all of the early club members were well-educated, but most of them were readers. The club’s mission, as recorded in the bylaws, was “the consideration and discussion of all vital and important questions of the day, and the imparting to others of the knowledge and benefits thus acquired.” This language dovetailed with the then-ongoing struggle to obtain the right to vote for women.

The 19th Amendment, which granted women the right to vote, had its roots in the Seneca Falls Convention of 1848 and was finally passed by Congress on June 4, 1919, and ratified on Aug. 19, 1920. The Thursday Club was launched in 1912, with the clear intent of bettering the status of local women.

A great tradition.

This present club year is no exception. Under the leadership of President Judy Cooper, the Thursday Club’s Community Relations Committee began the year with October’s “Stand Up To Cancer” program, which drew 250 locals and featured Susan G. Komen Foundation founder Rusty Robertson.

And now, the sequel: the Heart Healthy Workshop.

Mark your calendars and RSVP to the Thursday Club at (818) 790-1166.

See you there on Feb. 24.




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Get in touch ANITA SUSAN BRENNER is a longtime La Cañada Flintridge resident and an attorney with Law Offices of Torres and Brenner in Pasadena. E-mail her at anitasusan.brenner @yahoo.com.


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Published Published: Thursday, December 17, 2009 4:11 AM PST
Commentary
Around Town:
The club with heart keeps ticking
By Anita Brenner
La Cañada Valley Sun: La Cañada Flintridge, California