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Doing good keeps her young
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- By Kate Cole
- Wednesday, March 28, 2012
- Hits: 461
Ask long-time resident Helen Chazick how old she is and she won't hesitate to tell you 92 years young. Helen spent many of her 90 plus years doing her favorite thing — helping others. She hasn't stopped yet.
She volunteers five-days a week at the Flint Police Department's East Side Ministation where she is the coordinator.
Giving her time, talent and good will to organizations is what keeps her youthful — at least in spirit. She said she learned that from her father whose motto was, "It's better to give than to receive."
Chazick came to Flint in 1939 when she married her husband, John — a marriage lasting 45 years. He worked at the Buick and she at AC. Her employment ended when she became pregnant with the first of their three children, the late David, John and Joanne Cross.
Her advice to married couples experiencing problems is simple.
"Talk things over. Don't break a marriage commitment. John and I talked out our problems at the kitchen table," said Helen.
Her advice to young parents — "Get involved with your kids. Join them at their school functions."
Helen and John both worked as members of neighborhood and urban renewal groups.
Chazick recalls starting a kids' bowling league and said her daughter continued the sport through her retirement.
"She runs the bowling association and travels all over the country," Chazick said.
All of her children attended Flint schools and graduated from Central High School. All attended college. The boys graduated from Michigan State University. Joanne graduated as a registered nurse from Mott Community College.
Helen was working in urban gardens before the gardens got their official designation.
"I worked on all kinds of beautification projects. I would run back and forth to water them. Our entire group saved milk cartons or whatever we could to carry water. I'd fill them up and put them in the trunk of my car," she said.
The triangle on the corner of Nebraska Avenue and Kearsley Park Boulevard blossomed with Helen's help for many years.
"Once a man pulled up in a car while I was watering the triangle. He asked me to put out my hand then handed me two dollars. He said he had watched me running back and forth with the water jugs and wanted to help out," Chazick recalled.
She volunteered with the March of Dimes, Easter Seals and she has distributed East Village Magazine for more than 30 years. She volunteered with the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation for 30 years, and has been a volunteer at the police ministation since 1997 when it began.
Helen volunteered with the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts. She recalls driving to a Boy Scout Jamboree at Selfridge Air National Guard with a car full of excited boy scouts.
"Whenever they needed me — I was there. I even helped out with the Boy Scouts' paper drives," Helen said.
She was invited by Mayor Dayne Walling to meet Vice President Joe Biden when he visit Flint recently. He gave her a warm welcome, she says, because of her late son's service to the country spending more than 15 years at the Pentagon.
Reflecting on her early days in Flint, Chazick remembers a city where people worked together.
"We felt very safe. We could walk anywhere. People gathered on front porches and parents knew where their children were at night. If a family needed help — everyone pitched in," she said.
Is she going to retire anytime soon?
"I like to keep busy," Chazick said. "That's what keeps you going in your old age."
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