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Community Corner

Cape Resident Volunteers to Preserve Memories, Sense of Community

Even brain surgery didn't deter Mary Lamb, who organizes the Strawberry Festival along with a variety of other events in Cape St. Claire to help keep the community "family friendly."

Can you imagine Cape St. Claire without its signature ? Cape resident Mary Lamb certainly could not.

When the annual festival did not happen for two years in the 1990s, she walked into the community association offices and volunteered to help. She’s been chair of the Strawberry Festival Committee ever since and nothing—not even brain surgery—has kept her from being a leader in the community.

Lamb, raised in Annapolis, has fond memories of visiting an aunt and uncle in Cape St. Claire and going to the Strawberry Festival each year. As an adult, Lamb moved to the Cape where she and husband, Jimmy, had daughter Shelby in 1991.

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“I wanted Shelby to experience the Strawberry Festival as I had because I enjoyed it so much as a child,” Lamb said. “This was also a great way for me to get involved in the community.”

Lamb and a core group of volunteers has been the backbone of organizing not only the Strawberry Festival, but many other events in the Cape St. Claire community over the years.

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“Some of these people have been with me 100 percent of the time,” Lamb said of her dedicated group. “They always join me in putting events together.”

That says a lot about her cohorts since planning the festival and other community events is year-round work. In addition to the Strawberry Festival, Lamb’s mighty band of volunteers is also responsible for the community’s Easter Egg Hunt, Halloween Happenings, Breakfast with Santa and Safety Awareness Day.

The Strawberry Festival—the next is June 9, 2012—is a community showcase for many local organizations to fundraise. Scout troops, churches, sports organizations and groups use the extremely popular day-log event to run booths, sell food and take part in a parade. There is also a craft show.

“The festival itself doesn’t raise funds,” Lamb said. “The groups here raise funds and the money we collect is used as seed money for the next year’s events. We try to keep it affordable and family-friendly.

When asked what she enjoys most of the many activities she helps plan, Lamb said, “The Breakfast with Santa: I love the looks on the faces of the children when Santa arrives on a fire engine. It makes it all worthwhile.”

It is obvious, too, from the tone of her voice that Lamb probably enjoys all the events in which she has a hand.

“I am very glad that I got involved,” she added. I am very glad that I gave my daughter opportunities to be involved with these activities. This is very much a family-oriented neighborhood and I would like it to stay that way. It has been rewarding; it’s a good feeling.”

And lest you think she is already busy enough, Lamp is manager of the Caper community newsletter, which publishes 10 times a year, complete with advertising. She is also an elected member of the Board of Governors where she currently serves as secretary of the executive board and is community chair for the clubhouse. She also has a master's degree in business management from the University of Maryland and works full-time for Anne Arundel County as the traffic engineering streetlight coordinator.

Lamb also brings the same passion and talent for organizing to fundraising for a medical cause—a relatively new project that is most dear to her heart.

It started in 2009 when Dr. Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa, better known as Dr. Q, told Lamb that she was his “lucky patient of the week” after he operated on her and found that a brain tumor was not cancerous. Dr. Q is an internationally renowned neurosurgeon and scientist who works at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center. In addition to being a brain surgeon and professor, he leads the Brain Tumor Stem Cell Laboratory. Lamb has raised approximately $20,000 this year alone for the lab through a bull and shrimp feast last January and a crab feast in September.

“Dr. Q attends these events and brings his family,” Lamb said. “It gives you a good feeling to help out where you know it is needed.”

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