Western Wingding Helps Trauma Society Hit Pay Dirt : Hugs, Handshakes as 800 Attend

The Goldrush Camp at Knott’s Berry Farm was the site of an Orange County Trauma Society fund-raiser on Friday--the fourth annual Western-themed wingding hosted by the Associates, a support group founded and chaired by Virginia Knott Bender.

More than 800 guests paid $75 each to mosey down the park paths to the tented private party camp. The event raised an estimated $50,000 for accident prevention and various educational programs.

Welcoming guests were Bender, her husband, Paul, Associates president Peggy Goldwater Clay and OCTS founder Dr. John West.

After hugs and handshakes and backslaps--you get to know your pardners pretty well by the fourth benefit--guests lit out for the hosted bars and the big-as-a-barnyard open air dance floor.

Local rhinestone cowboys and cowgirls donned buffed boots, fringed jackets, string ties and Stetsons--as well as enough acid-washed blue jean material to stretch from here to the Texas panhandle.

Janet and John Fossum enlisted about 60 summer clerks and attorneys from the Newport Beach law firm where John works.

“Ginny and Paul (Bender) are longtime clients, so we like to be part of this,” Fossum said. “And it’s just a good party, you know?”

They knew out on the dance floor, where Don Thompson and Barbara Henry kicked up their heels with Barbara Towne and Norm Fast--the first foursome out there two-steppin’ and side-steppin’ and generally looking like they knew what they were doing.

Jeanne and Michael Keele got in on one of the line dances, as did Patty and Bob George. Among the throng on the ever-widening sidelines were Jim Shaw and Susan Barlow, who wore a gold-fringed leather jacket that looked like a cross between Hells Angels duds and Annie Oakley gear.

Bob Harlan, a Newport Beach lawyer and president of OCTS, pushed his white cowboy hat back on his head and said that trauma care in the county suffered a blow earlier this year when one of the four trauma centers closed because of lack of funds.

“Right now, we’re focusing on getting more community interest” and raising money, he said. The group is developing a new fund-raising program to attract corporate sponsorship.

At sundown, guests lined up for a buffet fried-chicken dinner and a slice of boysenberry pie. Then it was back to the dance floor or off into the wilds of the amusement park.