In the News

Lloyd Center Environmental Fundraiser Breaks Records for Coastal Protection

Dancing the night away under the big tent by the side of the sea and bidding-high on a glamorous array of items and services donated for auction, south-coast residents, corporations, and citizens from all over New England joined forces last weekend to make a strong statement on behalf of protecting the coastal environment, raising a record $200,000 at the Lloyd Center for the Environment’s much heralded fundraiser, CLAMBAKE XXI, held at Demarest Lloyd State Park. The proceeds, a new high for the event known locally as “Simply, the best” and presented this year by Toyota of Dartmouth, will go to directly benefit the Center’s expanding environmental research and education programs, which currently reach over 13,000 children each year in schools throughout the south-coast area.

After tolerating last year’s unprecedented deluge brought on by uninvited guest hurricane “Cindy”, organizers knew not what to expect in preparing for the 21st staging of the hugely popular event this year. However, late last month, when the last of the coveted 750 tickets was sold and the orders kept coming in, 2006 Co-Chairs, Marky and Rusty Shapleigh, knew they had a tiger by the tail, come rain or come shine!

And, “come shine” it was, as the day broke with clear skies, giving Event Manager and Lloyd Center V. P., Dr. Donald Douglas, reason to smile. With the sun barely above the horizon, Douglas and his team of hard driving volunteers went straight to work and began the challenging task of transforming the huge paved beachside parking lot into an elegant dinner-dance setting, designed expressly for a record crowd which would be imminently arriving with sky-high expectations.

By 5:30 in the afternoon, everything was in place under the huge and sparkling white Newport-style tent just back of the beach, seventy-five tables set with checkered tablecloths and lit by candles floating in three-tied glass centerpieces. Gigantic inflated red lobsters appeared to float in mid-air beneath each of the big-top’s majestic peaks. With each guest’s chair decoratively adorned with a nautical souvenir tote-bag and classic “XXI” cap bearing the Lloyd Center’s famous Osprey-face logo, a brand new 2006 “environmentally friendly” Prius hybrid was being carefully maneuvered into position to complement the Clambake’s signatory 1935 Ford “Woodie”. Bartenders began popping corks, flames leapt from the traditional bake-pit, and the second wave of Jimmy Buffet’s “Parrot Head” volunteers scrambled to their stations. The tiger had been tamed and the show was on!

For many, the Lloyd Center’s Clambake and Silent Auction mark the official start of the summer season. Despite the air of frivolity that traditionally marks the event, the folks at the Center take its success very seriously. Board President Mary Ellen Hawes Lees was passionate about the roll the clambake plays in backing the work of the Lloyd Center’s dedicated staff, pointing out that “resources provided through the event are critical to the continued growth of the Center’s highly regarded environmental research and education programs”.

Executive Director D’Arcy MacMahon was effusive in his praise for the Center’s volunteers, noting that “without their generous contribution of time and talent, the Lloyd Center could not possibly pull off an event of this magnitude and maintain its ability to bring top-notch environmental science programs to so many children and inspire so many citizens to make wise environmental choices”.