John Celebrates his 90th Birthday and 30 years of volunteering!
Long-time volunteer John Barron, recently came in to the hospice to celebrate his 90th Birthday. Tina Swani, Chief Executive, presented John with a certificate of achievement and a silver fountain pen to show our appreciation for his dedication. John joined Birmingham St Mary's Hospice as a volunteer back in April 1979 just after the Hospice opened to help do a bit of gardening but now 30 years on he’s still volunteering!
He saw an advert in a local newspaper that the Hospice needed willing volunteers to help do various jobs and as he’d just been made redundant from the Castle Bromwich car body manufacturing firm Fisher and Ludlow, he decided to keep himself busy and offer his services to the Hospice.
John became more and more involved with St Mary’s and not long after
the Hospice opened he was offered the role as Steward which was a full-time paid position. So making the change in his career John’s new role made him responsible for many different aspects of Hospice life for example portering, mortuary, stores, security, ordering medical supplies and cleaning the linen. John held this position until he retired from paid work in 1986.
John said “I enjoyed each and every day in my role as Steward but the one thing I enjoyed the most whilst working at the Hospice was the involvement I had with the patients and their families”.
As a volunteer John would often sit and talk to the patients about any worries or concerns they had and just lend an ear. He said “I met lots of people from all different walks of life and I think it’s what’s kept me going for all these years.”
In the early years, St Mary’s didn’t have a fundraising department so any fundraising had to be done at the weekend which John also gladly did in his own time as a volunteer. With the help of the Knights of St Columba he introduced an Annual Flag Day, which still happens each year but has been renamed as the Annual Street Collection. To date John has helped to raise a staggering £300,000 for St Mary’s Hospice.
As a Life Friend of Birmingham St Mary's Hospice, John Barron has not only donated thousands of un-paid hours as a volunteer but has achieved a great deal during his time with St Mary’s as a result of his fundraising and relationship building including new initiatives that are still going strong today.
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