EVERETT —They call themselves newcomers, but most of these women aren’t exactly recent transplants to Snohomish County.
Some members of the Everett Area Newcomers have lived here for nearly three decades.
On Thursday, the women’s social club celebrated its 40th anniversary with a lunch of chicken pot pie and pork chops, coffee, and homemade cake at Sno-Isle Skills Center’s Le Bistro near Paine Field. Nearly half of the club’s 80 members gathered, some of them well into their 80s.
Making friends can be a challenge when you’re new to a community. When you live alone, don’t have kids in school or are retired, it can be even more difficult.
That’s what Alice Stear experienced in 2001 after she retired from her job at UCLA Medical School’s Neuropsychiatric Institute and moved to Everett.
She was introduced by an acquaintance to the club and was pleased with what she found.
“They were warm, friendly, caring and good-hearted people,” Stear said. “It was like coming home.”
Phyllis Hawman, president of the club, moved to the area with her husband two years ago to be closer to their grown daughter.
She, too, turned to the club for friendship.
“So often when you move to a new area and go meet people, they already have an established group of friends and they’re not looking for any more,” she said.
Members of the Newcomers club read books together, gather for lunch and enjoy regular coffee chats. They’ve taken trips to unusual places, such as The Sky River Meadery in Sultan, and they have groups that play a mean game of bridge and mah-jongg.
The average age of its members has gotten older over time as younger women have joined the work force, said Lois Stewart. Most members are older than 60.
She joined Newcomers in 1978, after Boeing Co. transferred her husband’s job from Pennsylvania to Washington.
At first, the transition for them was “rough, rough, rough,” she said.
But the companionship Stewart found at the club helped smooth things out for her.
While she was in her 50s and her youngest son was almost out of school, Stewart said many members were young mothers who started day-care groups.
“Now most young mothers are working,” she said.
The group was founded by Marilyn “Kitty” Young in 1967, the year before rollout ceremonies for Boeing’s first 747 at Everett’s massive new factory.
Young, the wife of Everett banker Robert Young, held the club’s first social coffee at the couple’s stately home — Rucker Mansion, on a hill overlooking Port Gardner. Young also helped launch Everett’s Assistance League.
Barbara Davis, an original member, is no longer active with the Newcomers club, but still lives in Everett. She joined as a young mother of three, “because my husband thought I wasn’t getting out enough,” she said. For people with time to spare, she said, the club is a great place to make friends.
Deanna Dunkin Smith, the club’s immediate past president, joined after moving from Nebraska in 2003. She said the club is always looking for new members.
“If you’re new to town and don’t have friends or family, this group recognizes that,” she said. “Within a few months, there’s a good chance you’ll make a friend or two.”
Reporter David Chircop: 425-339-3429 or dchircop@heraldnet.com.
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