Eagle Bank, Ladies of Charity Honored by High Ridge Rotary

Eagle Bank and Trust and the Ladies of Charity were honored by the High Ridge Rotary as its business and charity of the year at a luncheon last week.

Jeff Queen, Rotary president, made the presentations to Michael Walsh, president and chief executive officer of Eagle Bank, and to Pat Hemenway, who founded the Jefferson County chapter of Ladies of Charity. Walsh, in turn, summoned Eagle Bank vice president Sharon Reineri to join him in accepting the award.

This year marks the 100th anniversary of Eagle Bank, which started in 1911 as the Jefferson Trust Company in Hillsboro.  Walsh became president in 1985. The bank now has 12 locations throughout the metro area, with more than 200 employees.

Walsh said the bank believes in serving the community through volunteerism, spending more than 1,400 hours a year assisting local churches, youth sports teams and community groups.

"As they help the community grow stronger, I think we grow stronger in the process," he said.

Hemenway, a former teacher in the Northwest R-1 School District, started the local Ladies of Charity chapter in 1971. The organization is especially active during the Christmas holiday season, providing gift baskets of toys and food for families that may be struggling during hard economic times.

The Ladies of Charity relies on volunteers to collect donated items, delivering baskets and coordinating the donations. It is a year-round effort. Hemenway says the organization is strongly supported by the Northwest district's staff and school groups in collecting the toys it distributes and for the food it collects, which is distributed mostly through food pantries and other local charitable organizations.