The Longest Day

LIGHTING THE

Sisters Make This Year’s TLD the Most Successful

By Sue Pelchat, Past International President, CT Mu

Dedicated participants and creative activities combined to make The Longest Day (TLD) the most successful in Alpha Delta Kappa’s history of participation. Each year on June 20, the day with the most hours of light, supporters raise funds for research to end Alzheimer’s and to help people with Alzheimer’s and their caregivers through services such as educational programs and a 24-hour hotline. This year marks the sixth time Alpha Delta Kappa sisters have joined in the fight.

“We wonder at what level we should pledge, but this year I was stunned,” ALZ Global Team Leader Sue Pelchat reported. “We pledged to raise $50,000 for the Alzheimer’s Association, but we surpassed that goal before The Longest Day dawned. On the morning of July 8, I checked the Alzheimer’s website. A∆K members had already donated $165,000. By suppertime the total was up to $168,000. And by my bedtime, it stood at $171,054.99. The generosity of our sisters makes me so proud.” By July 22, Alpha Delta Kappa donations had risen to an all time high of $193,176.10.

In addition to walking, running and swimming, sisters enjoyed tea parties and picnics, played Trivia, cooked for kids, held paint days, created cards, made care bags, rode bikes and held garage sales. Linda Warren VA Alpha cooked spaghetti dinners and delivered them to people affected by Alzheimer’s, while NC Gamma Theta sisters enlisted their mayor to shake a bucket and collect from passersby.

The leaderboard revealed the top ten team donations. They were: South Carolina Together We Can $21,940, California Cares $20,142, Georgia $19,623, Maryland Black Eyed Susans $12,398, Virginia $10,382, North Carolina Pearls $10,203, Texas Forget Me Nots $6463, West Virginia $5166, Ohio $5,156, and Florida’s Purple Cow Roundup $4,333. These ten teams combined raised $115,806.

Top individual fundraisers were Pippy Rogers, GA Beta Iota; Mary Futchko, VA Beta Lambda; Jill Stemple, WV Kappa; Michelle Gray, NC Beta Zeta; Dorothy Zielinski, FL Fidelis Rho; Dorean Barnes, and Linda Rissel, NJ Lambda.

“One wonders how we could ever outperform this year. But we all know we’ll try our best for the sake of loved ones who face the fight with Alzheimer’s every day,” said Pelchat.

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CA Beta Omicron

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CA Beta Omicron sisters participated in the annual The Longest Day RACE, a walking fundraiser for the Alzheimer’s Association. With COVID, it was hard to get sisters to meet as a group, so many did the walk with family or on their own. Some met at Mission Bay in San Diego to walk for sister Carol Castlen. Beta Omicron raised three times the expected amount. Next year’s walk is already being planned.

#1: Left to right: Becky Johnson, Mary Ann Jones, Cindy Acerno, Catherine McAweeney, Holly Foster

#2: Alice Bullard, Summer Cariss (Alice’s granddaughter), Melissa Cariss (Alice’s daughter)

LIGHTING THE LONGEST DAY

IA Nu

The sisters of IA Nu took a two and a half mile walk down the Lohrville, Iowa Nature Trail as their Longest Day activity. The June hike was the chapter’s first in-person meeting in almost a year.

SC Lambda

Lambda chapter met in person in June to celebrate The Longest Day and to complete its fundraising efforts. Christine Phillips, SC Alpha Beta member and SER Altruistic chair (2020-21), joined the members for a picnic lunch. She updated the members on the state’s fundraising past and present efforts. “It was great to have her join us and be in person, as well,” said Lynn Brown, SC Lambda past president and membership chairman. Between the May and June meetings, Lambda reached its fundraising goal of $1,500.

GA Delta

Sisters of GA Delta participated in the Longest Day activities with a picnic and walk along a garden path in Bartow Jenkins Park, Lawrenceville, GA. President-elect Beth Thompson and Altruism Chairman Carolyn Fetner planned the day. It was the first in-person meeting of 2021 for the chapter.

Sarah Yaggi, Immediate Past President, Terry Starner, President, Lisa Lang, Secretary, Beverly Mayes, Treasurer, Dawn Davis

Front row L to R: Terry Starner, Carolyn Fetner, Sarah Yaggi, Lisa Lang, Beverly Mayes, Dawn Davis; Back row L to R: Melanie Burdis, Louise Freeman, Simone Dreifuss, Judy Adcock, Priscilla Sukroo, Janis Smith, Beth Thompson, Lili Phillips, Judy Shaklee, Anne Chapman, Beth Vaughan, Nita Chambless (in attendance but not pictured: Diane Barnette)

Fighting the Darkness

“To come together to honor the strength, passion and endurance of those facing Alzheimer’s with a day of activity.” That is the purpose of the Longest Day according to a statement from the Alzheimer’s Association.

The fund raising event on the day of the summer solstice, the longest day of the year, is described as a “global call to action to shine light of hope and to fight the darkness” by the Association.

September is world-wide Alzheimer’s Month with September 21 designated as Alzheimer’s Awareness Day. According to the Association’s statistics five million American’s have this disease. The statistics worldwide are that one in every nine persons over the age of 63 will have the disease for which at this time there’s no cure.

MO Gamma Zeta

Melissa Bacon, MO Gamma Zeta, the state organizer for the Alzheimer’s Association’s The Longest Day, raised funds through themed daily walks. Pictured is Melissa in the themed outfits chosen by her daily sponsors that she wore on her walks. Her sisters say she set a great example. They found her emails filled with helpful information.

LIGHTING THE LONGEST DAY.

The Magic of Rowing Intentional 10s

By Jessica L. Willis, AK Alpha, State Co-President-elect

Robby Bear and I are AK Alpha Chapter sisters. We are also Alaska rowers who accepted the A∆K challenge to fight Alzheimer’s on The Longest Day by rowing with our teammates and friends.

Robby recruited seven other dedicated rowers for our 8+. I volunteered to be the coxswain. On the serene, drizzly morning of Saturday, June 19, 2021 at Sand Lake, the lake where Anchorage Rowing Association Club members train from early May to early October, we gathered to row, to remember, to support those fighting and to find a cure. For this challenge and to show our support, we decided to row with intentionality.

Our 8+ was made up of rowers who have family members, friends, coworkers, or neighbors living with (and some who lost friends or loved ones to) Alzheimer’s. Our row began with our standard warm up, then we settled into a steady pace. Feeling we were in our groove, I began to call out “Intentional 10s.” For every ten strokes, I called out the name of a loved one with Alzheimer’s and my crew rowed ten strokes for that individual. We did this down the 1000m lake and back, for 8000m, until we rowed ten strokes for each Alzheimer’s connection. As I steered our rowing shell, calling out every set of ten strokes, I felt the power and intentionality of each sweep rower in my boat. I could feel them pouring their hearts and minds into each stroke, rowing to make a difference in the lives of Alzheimer’s patients. How lucky was I to be a part of something so magical.

Rowers: Robby Bear, Joe Bear, Erin Baskaw, Vanessa Norman, Marietta Hall, Durelle Smith, Erin Duke, Elizabeth Embick, Jessica Willis, coxswain

Nebraska sisters participated in a walk for The Longest Day. Sisters of NE Lambda, Pi and Upsilon chapters are just a few who helped raise funds.