On the Town: La Providencia Guild’s fundraiser always in fashion
It was 1947. President Harry S. Truman was in the second year of his presidency, Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in Major League Baseball, Tennessee Williams’ play “A Streetcar Named Desire” was running on Broadway and NBC debuted a week-in-review news program titled “Meet the Press” that was moderated by journalist Martha Rountree.
That year also saw the meeting of a handful of local women at the home of Eleanor Hiller on the corner of Bel Aire Drive and Walnut Avenue to establish the Burbank-based La Providencia Guild of Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.
This year, as the guild celebrates its 70th anniversary, members staged their annual holiday fashion show and luncheon fundraiser with the theme “Seventy and Simply Stunning” at the Los Angeles Millennium Biltmore Hotel this past Sunday.
Close to 450 guild members and guests were welcomed to the group’s premier fundraising event by the gala’s chairwoman, Joan Chandler, and Lynn White-Shelby, who serves as the organization’s president.
The event, with ABC7 Eyewitness News anchorman Phillip Palmer serving as master of ceremonies, included a fashion boutique, silent and live auctions, entertainment by renowned ballroom dancers Michael Kuka and Natalia Lind and the day’s main event, which featured the designs of Lourdes Chavez under the direction of Lucinda Miedema.
Among those in attendance at the fundraiser that honored nurses past and present at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, were the guild’s executive board members Glenda Jones, Judy Pierce, DeeDee Rowlands, Nancy Wiggins and Sue Meckley as well as event committee members Donna Salant, Janice Shaffer, Debbie Fleiner, Jill Kessler, Kate Ogden, Laureen Endoso, Patricia Taylor, Beth Bowles, Debbi Lowman, Cynthia Faust, Kristine Veatch, Teresa Garcia, Shanna Warren and Lorelei Kelley.
Special guests who enjoyed the festive day included Bonnie McClure and Suzanne Lapis, who, respectively, serve as the chairman and director of the associate and affiliates program at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, Robert Weiner, vice president of development for the hospital’s foundation, City Councilman Bob Frutos, Burbank Unified school board member Char Tabet, City Treasurer Debbie Kukta, and City Clerk Zizette Mullins.
La Providencia Guild of Children’s Hospital Los Angeles is a part of the 37-member, all-volunteer force of 3,000 men and women who serve as associates and affiliates committed to raising funds for capital-improvement projects, equipment and the vital services offered by the pediatric medical facility.
DAVID LAURELL may be reached by email at dlaurell@aol.com or (818) 563-1007.
