SULPHUR SPRINGS - For more than a half century, Friendly Neighbors Club members have provided civic and community assistance around and across Sulphur Springs.

First organized March 5, 1958, this female group began 55 years ago to meet each month in a different member’s home.

“This group of ladies helped to instill a new sense of community pride by their community projects,” Pauline Holcomb, a charter member, wrote.

The group now meets the first Thursday of each month at the Sulphur Civic Center’s old school lunchroom, beginning at noon with a potluck lunch, and inviting the community to join them.

When started, “They met in [individual] homes,” current member Shirley Spencer said. “They’d meet and bring their young kids and spend the day. They’d embroider tea-towels or work on quilts, the project that particular hostess worked on at the time. I remember my mother bringing us when I was four and my sister was two, while my brothers were in school.”

Spencer’s mother, Nona Lea Holm, has been a Friendly Neighbors member since the 1970s, almost as long as Claudean Oaks, 93, the current group’s oldest member present at the 55th anniversary meeting.

“At first, we met in lady’s homes,” Oaks said. “We kept attendance down to about 15 members, because most of us didn’t have large [project] rooms back then. The club would give the hostess $5 toward an entrée. Of course, you could buy something for $5 back then. One lady might tell an uplifting story, and another would say something funny.”

“It was different back when it started,” Spencer said.

Spencer said the club started when neighbors came together to help each other with projects as friends in their west-side Sulphur neighborhood. It developed into Friendly Neighbors assisting burned-down home survivors by providing $25, quilts or blankets, giving “cheer baskets” of flowers or delivering food to the aging, or mailing cheer-me-up cards to those with illness or facing family tragedy - the same community-building projects the club supports today.

“It wasn’t a gossip club,” Oaks said. “Every once in a while, when we needed money, we had a bake sale - the only fundraiser we had back then. Dues were $5 a year, same as now.”

Charter members included president Virgie McMorris, secretary-treasurer Mattie Nell Wills and reporter Peggy Dills. Also present at the Friendly Neighbors Club meeting 55 years ago were Nona Lea Holm, Jessie Bates, Laura Daniels, Pauline Holcomb, Mary Deshazer and Laura Riter.

News, Pages 5 on 03/13/2013