To all outward appearances, Ruth Lyman Watkins was an intelligent, successful, pragmatic businesswoman who lived comfortably in a lovely home in Southern Pines. No one thought she was a dreamer.
Born in Peoria, Illinois, and raised in the suburbs of Chicago, Ruth witnessed the grim reality of poverty and its effects on the young boys and girls of Chicago's west-side ghettos. She dreamed of helping them, so she became a clinical social worker.
Ruth saw the despair of elderly people who could no longer manage to live in their own homes but whose only option was a nursing home. She dreamed of helping them, so she co-founded five long-term care facilities, among the first of their kind in the country.
Ruth moved to Florida where she met and married the love of her life, McNeill Watkins. They shared a life filled with music, theatre, literature, and travel. She dreamed they would grow old together in his ancestral home in Riverton, on the banks of the Lumbee River in North Carolina. But in 1997 her beloved McNeill died of cancer. Within a year, Ruth, widowed at 57, was herself diagnosed with cancer. And she stopped dreaming.
Ever the pragmatist, Ruth needed to decide where she would receive the best treatment. After checking out the reputation of Moore Regional Hospital and the credentials of the surgeons and the oncologists, she decided to be treated here.
She met other cancer patients and listened as they shared their dreams with her-dreams of having gas for their car or transportation to the hospital; of being able to afford medications and medical supplies without sacrificing their family's needs; of having a wig or a prosthesis so they could look like themselves again; dreams of somewhere to stay during the weeks of daily treatment.
They dreamed of understanding what the doctors were telling them about their disease; of someone who knew their fears; of someone who would listen.
For months, Ruth heard from her fellow cancer patients. Then she met another group of dreamers at the Foundation of FirstHealth. And she began to dream again.
In the late 1990s, Michael C. Rowland, M.D., Cancer Liaison Fellow for Moore Regional Hospital and a group of community leaders discussed with the Foundation their dreams of a Sandhills Cancer Fund to be used locally to provide medications for the poor and uninsured, transportation and housing for patients or families to stay when they're coming a long distance for treatment, and for a thousand other activities that would benefit cancer patients here in our region.
When Ruth received her cancer diagnosis, she had to make some serious decisions about both her life and her estate. "Whatever I have accumulated over the years represents my life's work. It is crucial that the recipients of these assets will be good stewards of the gift and carry on with the type of programs I endorse," she said. Although music, poetry, theatre and literature had enriched her life, her interest in health care had been a constant. She felt it was particularly important to help people locally. "Give where you live" became her touchstone.
When asked to join the Cancer CARE Fund committee, Ruth knew she could make the dream they all shared a reality. In 2000, the Ruth Lyman Watkins Cancer CARE Fund was established through a charitable trust with the Foundation of FirstHealth, to provide aid directly to cancer patients in the Sandhills. Her gift, a milestone for philanthropy at FirstHealth, meant that patients in need could immediately begin receiving support.
People who share Ruth's dream of helping someone-their neighbors, their friends, even their own family-through a difficult time in their lives, have generously supported the Cancer CARE Fund since its inception. "So many times you see money raised at the local level, but you never get to see the results," said a supporter. "With the Cancer CARE Fund, people right here, right now, can get the things they need while they're undergoing treatment. That is what is important."
When Ruth discovered that over 1,000 new patients at the time were treated each year at the Comprehensive Cancer Center-half of whom come from outside of Moore County, she began to dream anew.
There is nothing like a dream to create the future.
Ruth Lyman Watkins dreamed of a homelike residence close to the hospital where patients and their families could stay during the long weeks of treatment and where they would have access to the fitness center, support programs and seminars. "I feel most deeply about the hospitality house type of facility," she said six years ago. "I want to be there when the first shovel breaks ground." That was not to be. Ruth Lyman Watkins passed away in September 2002.
But her dream lived on in the Foundation's Stepping Stones Campaign and was realized in the creation of the Clara McLean House aka Clara's House. Clara's House provides a special place for outpatients who need a place to rest between treatments or while waiting for rides, where they can relax in a peaceful atmosphere. It will offer resources throughout the day for patients and their families as they navigate hospital services, procedures and overnight admissions, as well as helping with lodging arrangements for out-of-town patients undergoing outpatient therapy and for families of hospitalized patients. Clara's House, as Ruth had hoped, a place for others to begin to dream again.
To learn more about planned giving opportunities such as bequests and Charitable Remainder Trusts through The Foundation of FirstHealth, please call our office at (910) 695-7500.
