Pink Auction in Lynchburg to support breast cancer research

Ethel Mae Mitchell died from breast cancer in 1959.

 
Contact Violet Mitchell at 239-9209 for tickets, which are $15 in advance and $20 at the door — 2323 Memorial Avenue, Merredith’s Fine Dining.

Nearly 50 years later, her three daughters will honor her memory this weekend — as they have for the past three years — with an event to raise money, and awareness, to combat breast cancer.

Kathryn Drayton, Violet Mitchell and Louise Mitchell are the power behind Sunday’s Pink Auction Luncheon at Merredith’s Fine Dining in Lynchburg.

Their mother was 48 when they lost her to breast cancer —many years younger than the youngest of her five children is today.

The disease was to prove fatal to her sister, but not to Ethel Mae’s daughter, Louise.

“I am a 23-year survivor of breast cancer,” said Louise Mitchell. When her sisters moved to Lynchburg several years ago, they wanted to join her in her commitment to give back to the community, and to find a project that they could work together for the benefit of others.

No one is quite sure who came up with the idea of an auction, and then of a pink auction. “We all take credit for it,” said Louise to the amusement of her sisters as the three sat in Violet’s Wyndhurst home.

At first it was small venture, a group of friends gathering at one of the sister’s homes for a Pink Auction — lighthearted fun for a serious purpose with a helpful outcome.

The auction has made it possible for them to donate $4,000 for breast cancer research and education to national and local organizations.

“We keep none of the profits,” said Louise. “The expense and administration of the auction is paid for by us and the money raised is donated to an entity that works on research or education.”

They donate to established and well-known organizations that do cancer research and education.

Education, said Violet “for us means getting the word out there, letting people know what needs to be done, what’s available for them.”

Each year they accumulate dozens of pink items, beginning as soon as the previous auction is done. One of the best sources is just after the end of October.

“October is breast cancer awareness month, and after that the stores have things on sale,’’ said Kathryn Drayton.

Some auction items are cute, some useful and none are very expensive. When they go up for bid, they’re all a lot of fun.

“We’ve been doing it for four years — and this is the first time on this scale, selling tickets for the luncheon,” said Louise. In addition, they’ve had friends and businesses donate items for auction.

The event, from 2 to 6 p.m., is deliberately timed for a Sunday afternoon, after church.

Although they work hard and seem to enjoy the auction planning, the basis for it is a serious one to them. Their late aunt’s daughter, their first cousin, was recently diagnosed with breast cancer.

Violet is enrolled in a national research project called the Sister Study, which seeks to find causative links, genetic or environmental, among the sisters of breast cancer patients.

Ethel Mae Mitchell’s daughters describe her as a woman who was fierce in her commitment to her community. If money needed to be raised at her church, she would do it. If a neighbor needed a safe place away from domestic anger, she would bring her into her own home.

Her memory is so vivid to her daughters, it’s as though she lives next door.

The children grew up in Danville, but as adults moved to other cities.

Louise came to Lynchburg in 1987. Violet and Kathryn settled here within the past five years.

They’ll all be at the auction and luncheon, along with guest speaker and auctioneer, Maria Black.

“The whole idea,” said Louise, “is to have fun and raise money.”