LOCAL LIFE
ONE OF THE HILLS FINEST ...
Barbara has been a volunteer for Meals on Wheels for 50 years ! Credit : Hills Shire Council . by Lorna Gordon
Volunteers are the backbone of many groups and mean that not for profit organisations , schools and clubs can continue to support the community on a larger scale that they would be able to without them . They are the people who take the pressure off paid employees and can bring their own valuable skills and fresh ideas to the table .
In the Hills Shire we are lucky to have a lot of people who enjoy giving their time up to causes that are important to them and recently , the council held a thank you event for over 1,000 people who are registered as volunteers with them . Barbara Stewart was one of the volunteers who attended the Councils Volunteer night , and this special lady was thanked for her 50 years of dedicated service by Mayor , Peter Gangemi .
Barbara grew up in West Ryde and attended several schools . The first high school she went to burned down , so they had to make do with learning in the gym hall of the local boys school before moving to a newly built school where Barbara excelled in business studies . From high school she went to Sydney Tech to study business and accounting and at the end of her studies got a job doing bookwork for a small business .
While Barbara was at school , she met her husband through a church fellowship group that they were both in . They enjoyed the social side of the group and went with friends to dances and what began as a friendship turned into romance . The couple got married in 1967 . After their wedding they moved to their new home in Baulkham Hills , where they have lived ever since , although these days it now comes under Castle Hill when boundaries between the suburbs were changed .
When her son was still young , Barbara decided to join a mother ’ s group and was surprised to find her childhood friend Elaine was part of it . Elaine suggested that she take on the role as treasurer and Barbara ’ s journey into volunteering began !
“ It was Elaine who suggested that I join Meals on Wheels and that we do it together and I ’ ve been doing it now for 50 years ,” Barbara told me .
“ We started off doing the Carlingford route on the second Monday of the month and any other routes we might be asked to fill in and help with .
“ When I first started , we didn ’ t just take the food and drop it off which is what happens now , we would heat it up for our clients and spend some time with them , chatting and keeping them company . If we thought they needed help with anything we would try to get it arranged with their family or the council .”
While she was helping with Meals on
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6 ISSUE 110 // AUGUST 2024 theindependentmagazine . com . au THE HILLS INDEPENDENT