Sunday, January 23, 2011

Celebrating 60 Years of P.E.O. Sisterhood

Beverly received roses from her P.E.O. chapter this week celebrating 60 years as a member. She was inducted into her mother's chapter on January 2, 1951. Geneva Van Orden joined the P.E.O. in 1934 and was a member until her death in May of 1997. Geneva insisted that Beverly was going to join the P.E.O. at the age of 18. She was president of Chapter BL in Tulsa at that time and called a special meeting to discuss and induct Beverly as a member before she returned to Cornell College after Christmas break. Beverly remembers having the meeting at their home and having to cook dinner for the dozen or so members that came for her induction. She said that she had to sit in her bedroom with someone standing guard over her while the chapter discussed whether she was an appropriate candidate or not. Beverly has been involved with chapters all over the country over her 60 years as a P.E.O. sister. She joined Chapter E in Buffalo, New York in 1961; Chapter FI in Denver, Colorado in 1973; Chapter RW in California in 1990; Chapter HT in California in 1993; and Chapter HL in Vancouver, Washington in 2002.

3 comments:

  1. Beautiful layout, Shannon! Lovely photo, and quite an honor. Wow, 60 years! (I am looking forward to finding out what PEO is!) She was inducted just a few days before I was born!

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  2. Uh oh, I just let the cat out of the bag! LOL

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  3. What P.E.O. stands for is a secret. They aren't allowed to tell and they have passwords to get into meetings, etc. So I don't know what P.E.O. means.

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