Every year, St. Luke’s Palmerton Hospital Auxiliary puts on a dinner to honor its volunteers. 

Auxiliary members also use the evening to deliver the organization’s year in review. It’s a night of laughs, community and looking ahead to the future. 

But this year’s banquet, held in the Palmerton Hospital cafeteria Wednesday, came with a tinge of bitterness. It was the last meal auxiliary members would share in the hospital before its emergency department transforms into St. Luke’s 18th Care Now Center.

“It’s a bittersweet thing,” Marj Federanich, auxiliary president, said.

The auxiliary is undergoing changes. Owl’s Nest, the in-hospital gift shop run by the organization, closed earlier this year. And once St. Luke’s newest campus in Carbon County is constructed, Federanich said, the Palmerton auxiliary will join ranks with that at the Gnaden Huetten Campus in Lehighton. 

The auxiliary still intends to fundraise for St. Luke’s as it starts building the unnamed Franklin Township campus.

“No matter what each and everyone of you do,” Federanich told the crowd before her, “it goes without saying, it’s so appreciated by the people you touch and the community who supports us. Without all of you… we could not accomplish what we do.”

Ground broke for the original hospital in Palmerton in 1907. Equipt with just 11 beds, its mission was to care for injured employees from the New Jersey Zinc Company.

In its first year of operation alone, the institution treated 131 patients. Another 19 beds were added in 1911. 

Seeing its growing influence in Palmerton, a group of local ladies decided to get involved in the hospital. They formed the Palmerton Hospital Auxiliary in 1912.

More than 100 years later, Palmerton women are just as involved with their community’s care as ever. At the end of the dinner, Federanich announced that the auxiliary plans to pledge $100,000 to St. Luke’s over the next three years. The organization presented the first installment of that pledge Wednesday. 

Louise Koons, treasurer, said when she joined the auxiliary more than a year ago, she “did not know what to expect going in.”

“I found it (the auxiliary) to be this wonderful organization, filled with a lot of dedicated volunteers that work together, sharing their time and talent for the one common goal: the hospital,” Koons said.

“It is because of these caring, hardworking individuals that I am able to stand up here today and proudly present, on behalf of the auxiliary, a check in the amount of $35,000 to St. Luke’s hospital.”

According to the auxiliary’s treasurer's report, the organization had just over $4,300 at the start of July 2018. It raised just shy of $60,000 over the fiscal year, $22,000 of which came from its Nearly New Shop, a thrift store in Palmerton. The year’s expenses totaled $51,000, which includes the $35,000 donation to St. Luke’s.  

John Nespoli, president of St. Luke’s Gnaden Huetten & Palmerton campuses, said the future of healthcare in Carbon County is “brighter than ever,” and that by bringing merging the auxiliaries in Palmerton and Lehighton, the organizations will be able to extend their reach in the community.   

“It occured to me that everybody in this room, I’m sure, had either personal experience or a loved one who got care in this hospital,” Nespoli said.

“As we bring these auxiliaries together overtime, I truly believe that Palmerton will retain its identity with special events, special causes in the community, and healthcare, and beyond,” he added.

Captions:

Marj Federanich, Palmerton Hospital Auxiliary president, delivers her report at Wednesday’s banquet. DANIELLE DERRICKSON/TIMES NEWS

Members of the Palmerton Hospital Auxiliary pose for a photo with St. Luke’s representatives. Standing, from left, are: Marj Federanich, auxiliary president, Steven Serfass, St. Luke's, board chairman, Joe Guardiani, St. Luke’s director of development, Louise Koons, auxiliary treasurer, and John Nespoli, president of St. Luke’s Gnaden Huetten & Palmerton campuses.