Meet Lu Howard - by Beth Timson
Lu Howard
December 2017
Lu Howard and her husband spent their graduate school years in Chapel Hill, and a love of this part of the country drew them back here in 2000—and away from cold weather—when they retired. Lu has been a lifelong Midwesterner for the most part: born in Missouri, attended college in Arkansas, and lived in Wisconsin and Maryland as well as many years in Illinois. She spent many of those years being a mom to their two kids as well as working as an elementary school nurse, lunch lady, bookkeeper, and personnel manager, and putting in many hours with the Girl Scouts.
But, as she says, North Carolina has a long gardening season, and Lu and her husband Larry do love to garden! They bought a home in Orange County, with room to grow things; and Lu got recruited right away by neighbors to join OLLI and soon after to become a member of the Lifestyles Committee. It was not much longer until the popularity of the hands-on art classes created the need to spin off that focus into its own separate committee, and Lu became the volunteer co-chair of that group. “I was lucky to have a mother that let us do things when we were kids,” she says, “and I come from a whole family of crafting people!”
Lu says it’s not too hard to recruit instructors to teach hands-on art, and the classes are very popular with OLLI students. A student can keep re-taking an art or craft class and keep getting better, and many popular instructors have a regular following of students. For some local art instructors, OLLI courses are a part of their regular work. Favorite courses in painting, drawing, watercolor, and collage show up every term in the catalog; and OLLI also offers craft workshops (with instructors recruited by Lu) in which students register through the instructor. Lu herself sometimes teaches courses in basket weaving, bargello (a Florentine stitch process), and foundation pieced quilting.
She is concerned that despite the demand for these courses, they are necessarily limited. “We need rooms with more space, where we can spread out on tables, and bring in water,” she says—and winces, remembering the time she and others had to scrub stains from the carpets in the classrooms at JRC. Someday, she hopes, OLLI will have a large building of its own...but admits that is likely “a good ways out.”
Volunteering is a great thing to do, Lu says, and urges people to “Go for it!” She herself volunteers now at the Duke Gardens, on the plant propagation team, as well as at OLLI, and has formerly volunteered at the UNC Botanical Gardens. You gain a lot when you volunteer, she says: “I like sharing what I know, and I like getting to know people as well.” She laughs and says she’ll probably stay with the committee a bit longer, to keep up its continuity—and suggests that other OLLI members would enjoy volunteering if they would just give it a try.
Lu Howard and her husband spent their graduate school years in Chapel Hill, and a love of this part of the country drew them back here in 2000—and away from cold weather—when they retired. Lu has been a lifelong Midwesterner for the most part: born in Missouri, attended college in Arkansas, and lived in Wisconsin and Maryland as well as many years in Illinois. She spent many of those years being a mom to their two kids as well as working as an elementary school nurse, lunch lady, bookkeeper, and personnel manager, and putting in many hours with the Girl Scouts.
But, as she says, North Carolina has a long gardening season, and Lu and her husband Larry do love to garden! They bought a home in Orange County, with room to grow things; and Lu got recruited right away by neighbors to join OLLI and soon after to become a member of the Lifestyles Committee. It was not much longer until the popularity of the hands-on art classes created the need to spin off that focus into its own separate committee, and Lu became the volunteer co-chair of that group. “I was lucky to have a mother that let us do things when we were kids,” she says, “and I come from a whole family of crafting people!”
Lu says it’s not too hard to recruit instructors to teach hands-on art, and the classes are very popular with OLLI students. A student can keep re-taking an art or craft class and keep getting better, and many popular instructors have a regular following of students. For some local art instructors, OLLI courses are a part of their regular work. Favorite courses in painting, drawing, watercolor, and collage show up every term in the catalog; and OLLI also offers craft workshops (with instructors recruited by Lu) in which students register through the instructor. Lu herself sometimes teaches courses in basket weaving, bargello (a Florentine stitch process), and foundation pieced quilting.
She is concerned that despite the demand for these courses, they are necessarily limited. “We need rooms with more space, where we can spread out on tables, and bring in water,” she says—and winces, remembering the time she and others had to scrub stains from the carpets in the classrooms at JRC. Someday, she hopes, OLLI will have a large building of its own...but admits that is likely “a good ways out.”
Volunteering is a great thing to do, Lu says, and urges people to “Go for it!” She herself volunteers now at the Duke Gardens, on the plant propagation team, as well as at OLLI, and has formerly volunteered at the UNC Botanical Gardens. You gain a lot when you volunteer, she says: “I like sharing what I know, and I like getting to know people as well.” She laughs and says she’ll probably stay with the committee a bit longer, to keep up its continuity—and suggests that other OLLI members would enjoy volunteering if they would just give it a try.
Editor's Note : If you would like to show appreciation to the profiled volunteer, you can email to communications@olliatduke.org