Seven decades of helping the less fortunate

Final Charter dinner of Oldham Soroptimists which winds up after 70 years. Back l-r, Eunice Garside (50 yrs' membership), Kathleen Barnes (oldest member 86), Liz McConnell (regional president elect), Barbara Hulmes (pres. Ramsbottom). Front l-r, Carol Shackleton (pres. Oldham), Mayoress Valerie Knowles, Denise Baldwin (South Lancs. regional president).

IT’S the end of an era for Soroptomist International’s Oldham and District branch.

Seven decades of fundraising and support for good causes came to an end when the organisation met for the last time at the weekend.

Dwindling membership and difficulty attracting new, younger members with the time and energy to boost the club’s fundraising activities led members to take the difficult decision to close.

It is in the process of handing over the club’s records to Oldham Local Interest Centre, and offering its regalia for display in the silver cabinet at the civic centre.

Eunice Garside is the club’s longest-serving member, with more than 50 years under her belt.

She joined in 1961, following in the footsteps of her mother, Chadderton confectioner and caterer, Elsie Garside, who became a member in 1956 — 14 years after the club formed.

Eunice, who lives in Oozewood Road, Royton, and has been president three times, said the club was likely to have raised somewhere in the region of £100,000 during its 70-year history.

It has supported international causes through UNESCO, sending aid to women and children from young women outcast after being raped in Sierra Leone, to the “fish and chip” babies of Africa, who have no clothes and are wrapped in newspaper.

“We stayed active until the end,” said Eunice. “There are 500 vests and beanie hats we knitted which are ready to go out to the ‘fish and chip’ babies now.”
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