Three new portraits hang in the Dunedin Senior Hall of Fame. A luncheon ceremony welcomed three 2013 inductees at Hale Senior Activity Center on May 15. This year's banquet, set to an "Unleash the Power of Age" theme, traditionally honors one couple and one individual 75 years or older, who've lived in Dunedin for 10 years or longer and demonstrate the art of aging while volunteering their time in the community. This year's inductees are: Dave and Nell Thomas: The couple moved to Dunedin in 1977 and have been active in their church, the Masonic Lodge, the Dunedin Rotary Club and the Dunedin …

A whopping 300 volunteer hours in four years. It's more community service than anyone in Dakota Guthrie's 125-member Navy Jr ROTC unit at Dunedin High. City officials publicly lauded Guthrie's dedication to service, his heavy lifiting behind the launch of a scholarship fund honoring Dunedin fallen soldier Zack Shannon and his completion of Florida American Legion Boys State, a rigorous week-long leadership course in local and state government, on May 2. Guthrie's recent volunteer efforts helped catapult the Spc. Zack Shannon Scholarship Fund in the community. Shannon, 21, a 2010 Dunedin …

The ladies at the Dunedin Memorial American Legion Auxiliary, Unit 275, went on a shopping spree at Kohl’s in Countryside Mall last week. Boy, did they have fun for a good cause. Members were there to purchase shoes for Eckerd Raising Hope, a nonprofit dedicated to providing help to needy children and families.  Knowing that Raising Hope is wholly supported by the community, the members of Unit 275 of the American Legion Auxiliary voted to donate the proceeds of their annual “Cash Bash” to this very worthy program.  This year the “Cash Bash” program raised close to $4,500. The money went a …

Jennifer Auletta Lumm teaches six students with autism in her San Jose Elementary classroom. Some of the children's autism signs are so severe that they do not communicate verbally. To get through, Lumm says she's had to find other ways to talk with the children.  "So far, sign language and the communication boards on my iPad are the ones that have been the most successful," she said. She installs specially-designed, early education apps for children with autism. The apps help with speech communication, math and social skills, behavioral intervention and more. Lumm says iPad communication in …

Editor's note: This story originally ran in January. We're putting it in the spotlight again to highlight the accomplishments one person can make.   When Karen Gliddon was at the hospital with her cancer-stricken son, the last thing on her mind was leaving his side to get a toothbrush. "I didn't want to leave Mathew for a second," the Dunedin mother said, holding back emotion while her 2-year-old daughter Molli doodled on a piece of paper nearby. It's a topic she has a tough time talking about, but she insists, because she feels it is important. Mathew, her firstborn of three children, …

Hi Katie, I have just come in from Pinehurst Road where the street was lined with such an outpouring of love for Dunedin's fallen soldier Zack Shannon. I have posted but a few snaps I took along with many other people I am sure. I am just writing you to let you know how impressed I was with a very young man I met while I stood along Pinehurst Road. He caught my attention because he was young and walking alone up Pinehurst Road. No friends hanging on him and he seemed very quiet. He held a small flag in his hand and every once in a while he would look behind him to be sure he wasn't in the way…

Dunedin firefighters got to connect with some of their Scottish bretheren recently. Part-time Dunedin resident Michael Davis, who spends summers in Scotland, delivered a gift March 12 to the Dunedin Fire Department from his friend Gary Laud, a firefighter in Scotland. Davis presented Laud's gift of a framed picture of a Scottish firefighting crew along with Laud's fire department patch.  Laud, who works for the Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service in Grantown-on-Spey, Scotland, intended to deliver the gift personally while vacationing in the Dunedin area, but his trip was cut short …

You may have seen people wearing red T-shirts painting the pinky fingers of passersby purple outside some of your weekend destinations in Dunedin on Saturday. It wasn't a bizarre dream. It was a message from Dunedin area Rotary Club members about the realities of a potentially devastating childhood virus. Volunteers from Rotary Club of Dunedin, Rotary Club of Dunedin North, and Rotary Club of Dunedin Waterside were stationed outside the Dunedin Historical Museum, Walmart Neighborhood Market, and Honeymoon Island State Park on "Purple Pinky Day" Saturday, Feb. 23 collecting donations and …

The Neighborly Care Network's Meals on Wheels program delivers up to 1,200 warm meals to homebound residents everyday in Pinellas County. Sandra Narron, with Neighborly Care Network, says they're putting out a call for help. They have at least 500 people on a waiting list to receive meals, and they're likely to lose a quarter of their volunteer drivers in just a couple months. On top of that, Narron says they're already short volunteers. "Probably five, six years ago we had 1,000 volunteers. Now we have 800 throughout Neighborly Care Network," she said. Narron says about 25 percent of their …

A peacock, a pianist and a hair dresser all walk into a bowling alley.  Sounds like the beginning of a silly joke, but on Feb. 2, it actually happened at Dunedin Lanes. And it ended with a heartwarming punchline. A handful of area businesses and organizations decorated old bowling pins from Dunedin Lanes in an effort to help Paul's Project raise $1,300 toward care packages for families of critically-ill children in area hospitals. Karen Gliddon, a Dunedin mother who lost her 5-year-old son to childhood leukemia, helps run the organization, which is based in Palm Harbor.  The care packages …

It might not be first class, but Bosco is earning his wings this weekend. Judy Adair is taking the 10-week-old English bulldog to a new home in Michigan this weekend. He's going to Andrew, a teen whose greatest wish is to have him. Adair, an 11-year Michigan transplant whose family runs Creative Graphics on Douglas Avenue in Dunedin, said she has no doubt "he is meant for this boy." Bosco is moving north in place of another puppy, she explained from her patio chair in the Edgewater Drive neighborhood in Clearwater early Tuesday. One of her two adult bulldogs recently carried a litter of …

If you love animals, you might want to consider becoming a foster parent for the Suncoast Animal League.  Fostering is a rewarding and much-needed volunteer task that saves hundreds of animals at Suncoast Animal League each year. Puppies, kittens, dogs and cats are in need of foster homes for a wide variety of reasons: The shelter is overcrowded. They're too young to be adopted. They still need to be spayed or neutered. They have special medical needs. Interested in learning more? A special class for Suncoast Animal League foster parents will be held at 6:30 p.m. on Monday, Jan. 21, at The …

The storefront of Steve and Peggy Milby's dry cleaning business blends into the landscape of strip malls and vacant lots off of Dunedin's Bayshore Boulevard.  With Florida's unemployment rate hovering around 8.1 percent, according to the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics, the small business owners asked themselves what, if anything, could they do to help. Then, a sign. Three months ago, Steve Milby added a large white sign in the window of Causeway Cleaners, his 25-year business tucked snugly in the far corner of Causeway Plaza. It sticks out among a clutter of colorful stickers and miniature …

Editor's Note: Dunedin Patch received this heartwarming letter on Thursday, Dec. 20, 2012. It is from a woman who had just taken grandchildren to see Santa visit their neighborhood aboard a Dunedin fire truck, as part of the Dunedin Fire Department's "Operation Santa" tradition.  Hello and MERRY CHRISTMAS,  I rushed around to bring a friend's grandchildren to see the fire truck with Santa. I finally found a place to park on the side of the road. We could hear them coming and the kids were so excited. I saw the lights and the kids screamed, "He's coming, he's coming." When they reached us, we …

The Dunedin Youth Sailing Association was looking to purchase Laser sail boats so its progam could include more competitive racing options for the older teens. The only problem? The prorgam had no place to store the boats. That's when Alex Gawel, a 15-year-old member of Boy Scout Troop 10, decided to take it on as his Eagle Scout project. Alex Gawel learned to sail and race through the Dunedin Youth Sailing Assocation program, which caters to children ages 8 to 16. The Laser boat purchases would expand the Dunedin Youth Sailing program to include teens 16 to 18. His father Jeffery Gawel still…

Eddie Michels captured these photos of the Suncoast Brotherhood's 32nd Annual Toy Run helped raise unwrapped toy donations for children on Sunday, Dec. 16. Hundreds of motorcyclists gathered at the K-Mart parking lot in Clearwater and American Legion Post 275 with toys. Participants rode with a police escort to American Legion Post 275 via State Road 580 and Bayshore Boulevard. All toy donations go to the Pinellas County Foster and Adoptive Parents Association.

Dec. 5 was a grateful day for Al Barrett and countless Kenyan women he has never met. Barrett, the 30-year owner of Dunedin Canvas Works and founder of Threads of Hope, finished loading a huge shipment of sewing machines and material that is now on its way to outfit an up-and-coming women's sewing center that will teach new life skills to a dwindling nomadic people in Maasai, Kenya. Construction of the sewing center is slated to begin in February 2013. Barrett and his wife's charity, "Threads of Hope," has sent sewing machines to 14 countries across the world, with a focus in Africa. The …

Young Maria Norman asked for stuffed toys, rawhide bones and dental sticks for her 11th birthday. The gifts weren't for herself, but for the rescued shelter dogs of Dunedin Doggie Rescue. "One thing we've talked about," Maria's mother Kathy Norman said, "is kids have so much every birthday — maybe it's a good idea to think about giving back. I got her to thinking, and she was thinking of an organization to donate to instead of getting birthday presents." For her selfless act of service, Dunedin Doggie Rescue publicly recognized Maria, a fifth-grader at Curtis Fundamental Elementary, when she …

Correction: The Giving Tree will accept donations through Dec. 20. An earlier version of this story had an incorrect date. Dunedin's "Giving Tree" is back at City Hall this December. That nautical-themed decor on the oak tree outside City Hall, named "The Giving Tree" by staff, signifies the start of the second "Operation Twinkle," an annual, city-sponsored food and toy drive. The city is soliciting community donations of non-perishable food items, grocery gift cards and new children's toys in the lobby at City Hall, now through Dec. 20. The St. Vincent de Paul Food Pantry at Our Lady of …

An Oldsmar audio and video marketing company made the largest single donation to The Backpack Lady Project to date last month. Spectrio donated 42 backpacks to Rob Ditro's charity. The Dunedin man started it last year to honor his late mother's legacy.  "As fortunate as we are to be able to feed and clothe our families, and make sure our kids have what they need in school, we know that there are a lot of families that struggle. We are always looking for ways to give back to our community and this was the perfect opportunity," Noah Blankenship, Spectrio national account executive, is quoted in…