Member Stories

Read the amazing stories our members have written about why they are a Lion!

“A BIT OF HISTORY”

THE EVERETT CENTRAL LIONS CLUB

I have been asked to write a history of Everett Central Lions Club, WOW! No small task, for our club was chartered in May of 1920. Thus we are the first Lions Club in the Pacific Northwest. That fact has sparked a little disagreement over the years. Our club, as well as the many clubs that make up the International Lions Organization, subscribe fully to the motto of the international association, “WE SERVE”.

The first international convention was held in Chicago by the founding fathers in1925,

They invited a guest speaker, the blind Helen Keller. She spoke of her plight as a blind and deaf person, and asked the new Lions Organization to promote blindness as our main focus. We made that promise and Lions have never wavered from that promise of so many years ago. The Everett Central Lions Club, as with the many Lions clubs around the world, have honored Helen Keller in that promise. One of the ways we, and many other Lions clubs do that, is by collecting used eye glasses from collection boxes placed in businesses in our communities, and we help those who cannot afford eye glasses, by cleaning, repairing, and measuring for strength, then sending them overseas to impoverished countries, where the people would not be able to obtain them otherwise, as well as hearing aids, allowing these people to greatly enhance their lives.

I have given you a brief overview of the Lions organization from its beginnings' and as it remains today. In future reports I will tell you more of the work of the Everett Central Lions Club. Thank you.

By Lee A. Woodard

Past Club President; Past District Governor; current board member