After 30 years, Mary Lou Hambelton retires from Dora VFD board


Dora VFD chief Monte Shipley hugs Mary Lou Hambelton at a surprise retirement party. Hambelton has served as the Dora VFD treasurer for 30 years and was active in starting the department in the mid-1980s.

The Dora Volunteer Fire Department members surprised Mary Lou Hambelton with a retirement party earlier this month. Hambelton has served as Dora VFD board treasurer the past 30 years. She and her late husband, Gerald, were founding members of the department when it began in early 1986, and they donated the land where the firehouse stands today. DVFD members know Hambelton as a dedicated and active part of the women’s auxiliary who has worked hard at fundraising and also at cleaning the firehouse and mowing the yard. During the party, Mary Lou said she “didn’t do anything that anyone else didn’t do.” But DVFDS members insisted the department could never have been founded and progressed the way it has without her help. “Mary Lous has been great to work with over the years,” DVFD chief Monte Shipley told theTimes. “She has done so much for this department.”

 
 

Ozark County Times

504 Third Steet
PO Box 188
Gainesville, MO 65655

Phone: (417) 679-4641
Fax: (417) 679-3423