The early years of Moses Lake Senior Center
Sally McLanahan looks at photos of past board members and volunteers of the Moses Lake Senior Center.
Ex-director Sally McLanahan recalls organization’s start
MOSES LAKE — Sally McLanahan, 85, is a former Depression-era child and learned to make do with little.
With just $36, the Moses Lake woman wasn’t discouraged when she and two community members worked to start the Moses Lake Senior Center in 1972.
She called the building’s owner, Harry Higgins, of Spokane, to inquire about buying the building. He inherited the structure.
“At the time we bought the building, we had $36 in the bank from a rummage sale,” she says. “I called Mr. Higgins and he said the building wasn’t condemned. I read his condemnation and he said ‘come to Spokane.’”
Once in Spokane, McLanahan, Henry Becker and Grover Hopkins met with Higgins’ attorney.
“It was amazing, this lawyer was sitting at his desk with his feet up on his desk,” she said. “We negotiated and had no idea what we were going to offer him.”
For some reason, she came up with the figure of $8,900.
The lawyer wanted $20,000.
“We negotiated for probably an hour and finally he said he would take $12,000, but you have to pay $250 per month until it’s paid,” she said.
McLanahan agreed, but added they wanted the rent back if the full balance was paid within a year.
On the way home, Becker and Hopkins told her they had to find $1,000 in earnest money by Monday. It was Friday.
McLanahan contributed her $400 paycheck and received $200 from her mother, Martha Isitt, of Walla Walla,
Either Becker or Hopkins said they would provide $200 and obtain another $200 from a neighbor.
“It just took wings, it flew along the way,” McLanahan recalled. “So we were the original four who originally put down the money. It was quite a challenge.”
They sold 129 notes with 8 percent interest, paying the balance and the notes by the following November to own the building.
The center opened on June 2, 1972.
The building was the former Roma Inn located on Third Avenue, which she described as “quite a prominent restaurant in 1955.”
“This was a totally condemned building,” she recalled. “There were boards with cracks across the front, a restroom was totally destroyed, someone stole all the tile off the floor and we didn’t have any heaters.”
Throughout the years, improvements were made to the building. She credits the Columbia Basin Job Corps, The Paul Lauzier Foundation, Lions, Eagles and Rotary for their support.
But during the early years, McLanahan remembers sitting in the corner of the current dinning room all winter long with a portable heater at her feet.
McLanahan was inspired to start the senior center by a woman who was paralyzed on one side and had very little income.
McLanahan was then the director of programs for Community Action in Moses Lake and later worked as director of the senior center for 14 years.
She is now an honorary board member for the organization.
“After I got these people organized, I had a strange dream at 3 a.m.,” she said.
The dream told her of the need for a senior center in Moses Lake.
“I followed that dream,” she said. “Most people don’t get to have that dream. I’m one of the ones who does.”
She’s enjoyed her time at the center.
“It’s friendly. I think it’s provided the needed programs we need for our seniors,” McLanahan says.
The facility offers a pool room, quilting room and bands playing every Friday and sometimes in the middle of the week.
“They have a tremendous meal program,” she said. She credits the director, well-trained staff and volunteers for keeping the programs going.
In the future, the center wants to replace doors, windows and lighting in its second-hand store next door.
She’s found seniors are concerned with their health, finances, loneliness, transportation and old age.
“Some are feeling much younger than others, but there’s quite a few with health problems,” she said. “Some are downsizing to care for themselves, but with health issues, they just come.”
Having a good attitude helps many seniors and plays an important role in their lives, along with faith in the Lord and patriotism, she said.
“Most of the seniors you meet here are all doers, they have been,” McLanahan said. “It’s probably our faith in the Lord that has got us this far.”
Before the building was opened, some seniors met to socialize, but not at a senior center.
“They were not part of the group, not part of my wonderful volunteers,” she said. “This could have never been without my volunteers. It sort of became like a big family.”
McLanahan remembered how the particular group went to the City of Moses Lake and requested senior housing be allowed in town.
“That’s why we have Beech Court,” she said.
McLanahan was raised in Walla Walla. She remembers when times were both good and tough.
Before the Depression, her father worked as a ranch foreman. The family had good food and a good place to stay.
In 1929, she moved into her uncle’s shack with her parents, she said.
Her brother lived with her grandmother and her father changed jobs. He drove a team of horses for 50 cents a day and was part of the crew cementing the creek in Walla Walla to prevent overflowing.
Her father’s earnings went to her uncle for board.
McLanahan remembers being hungry and eating a lot of potato soup, which she hates now.
They would eat a potato one night and potato peels the next day.
Today, she views the economy’s slowdown as a depression, but not as severe as when she was young.
She’s seeing many kids returning home to live with their parents and grandparents helping to finance their grandchildren’s college education.
Even so, anything’s possible with hard work.
One example she noted was her grandson. He will soon be an associate professor and also has a wife and two young children, she said.
Her husband, Mac McLanahan, retired from the City of Moses Lake’s engineering department after 31 years.
She is a lifelong member of Soroptimists, a former clogger and recipient of the Jefferson Award for Public Service for her senior center work.
Cynthia Calbick, of Moses Lake, said she’s known Sally for a long time.
In the past four or five years, they grew closer during alumni association activities.
“She just does everything with such great enthusiasm and a positive attitude,” Calbick commented.
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