Two Lions clubs — Saratoga Springs and Albany & Troy — came together to celebrate 100 years on Oct. 11, with a dinner for about 200 people at the Gideon Putnam Hotel, and a roaring ‘20s theme replete with period dress, antique cars, a dixieland jazz band and a speakeasy feel to the night’s event.

“Everybody got into the theme,” says John McDonald, an organizer of the event and past president of the Saratoga Springs Lions Club.

The night included a speech from Keller Johnson, the great-grand niece of Helen Keller. It was Helen Keller’s challenge to the early Lions clubs to become the “Knights of the Blind” that gave those clubs a vision and focus beyond the motto “We Serve,” McDonald says.

Johnson, McDonald says, told the story of Anne Sullivan, the teacher and advocate for the blind who taught a young Helen to be able to communicate with the world even though she could not hear, see or speak.

As a child, Sullivan had an alcoholic father who gave his children to a Massachusetts institution after his wife died. There, Anne was abused and, partially blind from an eye infection, was ignored or even held in solitary confinement.

“An aide baked her some cookies one day and befriended her,” making life more bearable, McDonald recalls.

She eventually was able to advocate for herself and move to a school. It was this education that led her to teach and help others.

The story, according to some online accounts, is more apocryphal than historically accurate, but it highlighted what became a theme of the evening: “That single act of kindness or that single act of service, you just never know what impact that’s going to have.”

“It just really brought it all home,” McDonald says.

Jerry Gordon, the acclaimed Capital District jazz advocate and president of the Albany & Troy combined Lions club, called the party “a good evening” and says that it was a nice way to celebrate service to the community. While calling it clichéd, he says, “We’re looking forward to the next 100 years of serving our communities.”

Recent projects include: Saratoga Stars ice skating program that runs every winter and helps children with developmental or mental challenges to skate; Camp Abilities Saratoga, a week-long sports camp for kids who are blind or have low eyesight; and the Lions Eye Institute at the Albany Medical Center.

“There are two constant threads over that 100 years,” McDonald says. “The first one being that we work hard. We put in a lot of time, and we turn out when a project is going on.” The second? Having fun while doing it.

Giving back

Complexions owner Denise Dubois is a known longtime supporter of the American Cancer Society (ACS) and October’s Breast Cancer Awareness Month — and you’ve got one more week to help her in this year’s efforts. Donate to ACS while at the Broadway spa and be entered to win a raffle valued at $500. Or, buy local — a portion of all online sales of the local beauty icon’s Dubois Beauty skincare line will be donated directly to ACS. Happy shopping. complexions.com

Crime

Amsterdam resident Jodi Drygula was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison for mail fraud and conspiracy to commit mail fraud, New York State Inspector General Lucy Lang has announced. Drygula — with Anthony Camou of Las Vegas — submitted false unemployment insurance claims to the NYSDOL using the personal identifying info of three other people to fraudulently obtain more than $250k in unemployment insurance benefits intended to support New Yorkers during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the investigation.

Under her plea agreement, Drygula was also ordered to pay $238,193.25 in restitution to the State of New York and $22,572 to the State of California, and she agreed to forfeit $38,900 in fraud proceeds.

Track

Sovereignty — favorited to win the Breeders’ Cup — left the Spa City for California yesterday. “He looked good,” his trainer, Bill Mott, told Bloodhorse in a report published October 19 after his final workout at the Oklahoma. The winner of the Belmont, Travers and Jim Dandy at Saratoga Race Course — plus the Kentucky Derby — will do a last workout at Del Mar before the Halloween weekend Grade 1 stakes race on the world stage.

Letter to the Editor

Dear Editor,

I listened to the LWV debate, and Jess Troisi stood out as a candidate who combines capability and experience with integrity, composure, and genuine class. In contrast, while Mr. Moran spoke at length about his accomplishments, I couldn’t help but wonder—if everything is so wonderful, why the ongoing controversies and legal bills?

Best,

Anna Smith

Saratoga Springs, NY

Early voting starts Saturday! The Dispatch will cease the publication of all letters to the editor this Friday, so letters need to be sent to [email protected] by end of day Thursday (tomorrow, Oct. 23). Thank you.

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On the cusp of becoming a rock icon, this budding musician arrived in Saratoga for an ill-fated three months but just couldn’t hang. He disses our fair town — and its music scene — in his brand-new memoir, on Amazon now.

Rock star Evan Dando of The Lemonheads has long appeared on Skidmore’s celebrity list, with the vague “attendee” title instead of graduating class. But in his new memoir Rumors of My Demise, the ‘90s icon finally tells the full story.

And it wasn’t pretty.

About 40 pages into the book, which came out earlier this month, Dando leaves Massachusetts to give higher education a shot, putting on hold his band that would make him a world-famous rock star.

“I was excited about being out on my own, but the thrill was short-lived,” wrote Dando, now 58. “After Boston, Skidmore felt small and dull.”

Ouch.

During his short time in the Spa City — which he told Magnet magazine was “90 days and 90 nights” — Dando had rock music on the brain. “Saratoga Springs is where Don McLean wrote ‘American Pie,’” reads the memoir. “Other than that, Skidmore didn’t have a lot going for it. There wasn’t much of a music scene in Saratoga Springs.”

A creative soul clearly not meant for college, the only class Dando didn’t fail was acting — and he was ready for the freewheeling rockstar life. “I didn’t buy books, I bought drugs,” he writes. He also cops to a lot of speeding tickets while in the Spa City, which he of course didn’t pay for.

On a lighter note, Dando gives a nod to his roommates, who have no doubt told more than a few people about that short time in 1986 when they slept in the same room as Evan Dando.

“I had two roommates in my dorm room and one of them was the nephew of the keyboard player in Lipps, Inc., the group that had the hit ‘Funkytown,’” Dando remembers. “My roommate brought the actual keyboard used in that song with him and it was in our room. I got along with my dorm mates just fine. They weren’t the problem; I was.”

Dando’s musings about Saratoga and Skidmore (he lasted less than a semester) go on for a few pages, before the budding rock star takes off to form a now-iconic ‘90s alternative rock band and reach world-wide fame with its cover of “Mrs. Robinson.” The Lemonheads play the Bearsville Theater in Woodstock Nov. 21.

Rumors of My Demise is out now.

ICYMI…