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Royal Purple national president visits

Lynda Nolan, Royal Purple of Canada’s national president, made her official visit to the lakecity branch, Jan. 27, but it was more like coming home to old friends than exploring new territory.
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The lakecity Royal Purple’s Honoured Royal Lady Siet Kielman (left)

Lynda Nolan, Royal Purple of Canada’s national president, made her official visit to the lakecity branch, Jan. 27, but it was more like coming home to old friends than exploring new territory.

Nolan is from Prince George and knows the lakecity Royal Purple well, so there were many hugs given out as members joined her for lunch and the pep talk of encouragement she gives to members on her official visits.

Nolan also has a special connection to Williams Lake in that lakecity member Doreen Zimmerman is Nolan’s national historian this year, in charge of keeping a scrapbook record of her travels.

Nolan says she is the first national president or Supreme Royal Lady appointed in Western Canada in three years, so she is concentrating her official visits to chapters in the western provinces of B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.

She was installed in Yellow Knife in July 2010 and will finish her term in Gander, Newfoundland this July, having visited some 80 lodges during her term.

Like many volunteer organizations today, she says the Royal Purple’s biggest problem is attracting and maintaining membership.

On her visits she is learning about ways various lodges are encouraging new members to join them. She says young people today don’t have a lot of time for meetings but they do enjoy having a specific task to do.

She says more casual attire is also being worn by younger members today, for instance a golf shirt in the their purple and white colours with the Royal Purple logo, paired with dress pants, instead of formal jackets.

She says she has also embraced Facebook as a way to communicate with members.

Nolan says the biggest benefit of membership in Royal Purple is that you develop friendships while working for your community and there are also opportunities to learn financial, organizational and public speaking skills.

She says they have a lot of fun attending regional and national conferences and events such as the annual bonspiel coming up in Hanna, Alberta in March, and the annual dart tournament being held in Yellow Knife this year.

This year, Nolan says she and Elks national president Dave Huley of Yellow Knife are coordinating their visits to communities and have designed their service pin together to show how Elks and the Royal Purple work together.

She says her theme is “focus” — focus on the future and ways to encourage and recruit new members and show a willingness to change. Huley’s theme is “together” so the pin has the words “focus” and “together” on it.

“We say together we focus so we make a point of trying to do things together,” Nolan says.

The Royal Purple has 5,000 members working in 190 lodges across Canada.

In 1971 Williams Lake Royal Purple had 158 members. Today they have 35 members and many of them are close to retirement, says local lodge 126 Honoured Royal Lady Siet Kielman.

The Elks and Royal Purple work primarily to provide services for children and seniors on a local, provincial and national level.

The national Elks and Royal Purple Fund for Children provides funds for any child under the age of 19 who needs assistance with speech and hearing.

“Cochlear implants are a big thing we do a lot of,” Nolan says.

In this region, Royal Purple and Elks raise funds to help support the B.C. Hearing Centre in Surrey, as well as speech and hearing clinics in Edmonton, Calgary and Saskatoon.

Nolan says she participated in a walk-a-thon in Saskatchewan where she met a 16-year-old girl who was learning to dance after having a cochlear implant.

“If we hadn’t helped her she wouldn’t have been able to dance,” Nolan says.

In B.C. Elks and Royal Purple also support camps for children in Prince George, Aldergrove, Salmon Arm and on Denman Island that are open to any youth organization providing camp experiences for children and youth under the age of 19.

Nationally the organizations also fund the Elks and Royal Purple Drug Awareness Program, the Elks and Royal Purple Literary and Poster Contest, each promoting a drug free lifestyle.

Locally the Royal Purple joined the Elks in raising funds to establish the audiology centre in Williams Lake and initiate the first hearing testing for kindergarten students. They also support two student bursaries, help to purchase sports equipment for children in need and with the cost of transportation to take children for hearing tests in Vancouver.

The Elks and Royal Purple raise funds locally by renting the Elks Hall for business meetings, dances, special teas and dinners, craft fairs, weddings and other community events. They often cater to many of the events from their kitchen.

The Royal Purple members also make meat pies in their kitchen which are popular at their craft fairs. They made and sold 608 pies last year.

The Good Food Box program is run out of the Elks Hall.

Bingo is held in the hall on the last Sunday of each month starting at 11:30 a.m.

Comer Station Pub helps them out on Fridays with Elks and Royal Purple meat draws on Friday evenings.

Nolan says both Elks and Royal Purple started in Vancouver and branched out from there. The Elks organization turns 100 in 2012 and the Royal Purple will follow with their 100th anniversary in 2014.

People can find out more about the Royal Purple on www.royalpurple of Canada.org.