GBMC Volunteer Joins Yaggy Society and Gives Back... Again
Shirley Lewis has volunteered at GBMC, since the beginning.
Shirley Lewis' life is marked by music. It's how she met her husband, it's how she made a living and it's how she has chosen to give back to her community, including as a Spiritual Support Services volunteer at GBMC.
"I started in Spiritual Support because the lady who was playing the organ was getting too old, which is a laugh because I'm over 90 now and I'm still doing it," Shirley said. "They knew me through church connections, and that I substituted on the organ at various churches. I alternated with another woman, and we played the organ in the GBMC chapel on Tuesdays and Thursdays."
Prior to being asked to play GBMC's organ, Shirley became involved with door-to-door fundraising and community engagement to help what was then "the new county hospital" get started, thanks to a recommendation from her aunt.
After many years volunteering, Shirley solidified her commitment to GBMC by contributing a charitable gift annuity in support of The Promise Project Capital Campaign in 2021. Charitable gift annuities are gifts that provide an income tax deduction in the year of the gift and a generous lifetime income stream to the donor. GBMC welcomed Shirley into the prestigious Elizabeth Duncan Yaggy Society, reserved for those who include provisions in their estate plans for our healthcare system.
Shirley Lewis had been a music study since the age of 5 when a Peabody teacher, Eugenia Arnold Ruth, visited her home on Wolfe Street. Shirley played piano, took singing lessons and later in life began to play the organ with teachers Richard Wegner and George Woodhead. Her late husband, Wm. Albert Lewis, who passed away in 1989, was a tenor soloist behind her in the choir. They married in 1950.
As a young mother in Baltimore City, Shirley offered private lessons to a neighborhood boy recovering from an injury. When word got around her neighborhood, other mothers wanted Shirley to teach their children, as well. At one time, she had 22 pupils.
For years, Shirley played piano on Tuesdays and Thursdays at GBMC. She credited the origins of her music ministry to GBMC's former Chaplain Rev. Joe Hart. It was Rev. Hart who first approached Shirley with a request to play the piano, years ago, after a generous benefactor donated the grand piano to GBMC.
"Music reaches people," Shirley said. "Sometimes I don't feel like I do enough as a GBMC volunteer, but I have so many people who tell me music makes a difference and they thank me. I minister to a lot of people through music. I know it reaches people when nothing else does."
Shirley was always thoughtful in her musical selections when she played piano as a GBMC volunteer. She played Christmas music during the holiday season or military songs for veterans.
"They would give me the high sign as they came through the lobby because I was playing their song and people would come up and say, 'That was my husband's favorite song,' Shirley said. That makes me feel good."
Shirley has touched the lives of many inside and outside of GBMC through her music and will continue to do so with her philanthropy and volunteerism.
"The volunteers are a really good group of people," Shirley says. "Everybody is there because they care about volunteering. And I think the volunteers are treated wonderfully. GBMC certainly does take care of their volunteers, and when I go to other hospitals, I always think ours is better!"
GBMC is greater because of volunteers and generous benefactors like Shirley Lewis.
The Elizabeth Duncan Yaggy Society honors loyal benefactors who have provided for GBMC in their estate plans or with a gift to GBMC that pays them a lifetime of income. Please contact us to learn more.
