Helen Grishman spent her working life as an assistant district attorney, and when she retired in 2000 she did what she tells other retirees to do: she found a way to keep serving. She joined the Rotary Club of Pleasantville that year and has rarely missed a Thursday since. "I've formed wonderful friendships and been able to do a lot of good for the community," she told The Inside Press in 2024.
Three times president
Helen has led the club as president three times, most recently through its centennial year. It fell to her to open the hundredth-anniversary gala at the Pleasantville Manor in June 2024, and it was Helen, Irene Powers and Sue Gulotta who spent an afternoon the previous fall going through a century of photographs to tell the club's story. "We stand on the shoulders of giants," she said of the members who came before. "It means 100 years of service not only to the community but to the larger world."
She is a Paul Harris Fellow several times over, Rotary's recognition for sustained giving to The Rotary Foundation, and she now serves the club as a director and as its Rotary Foundation chair, the link between Pleasantville and the international foundation that funds polio eradication, clean water and literacy projects worldwide.
Where the money comes from
Much of what the club gives away each year passes through Helen's hands first. She handles sponsorships for Generous Pour, the spring tasting that funds sixteen local beneficiaries from the Pleasantville Farmers Market to the Mt. Pleasant Library, and she has been a fixture of the Pancake Breakfast for well over a decade, apron and all. Around the village she is the one at the Rotary table on Pleasantville Day, where the club brings an ambulance for children with special needs to explore, and at the Arbor Day tree giveaway.
Her favorite part of the job is still the people. Of the club's hundred-year roster: "It never ceases to amaze me how this little town had so many extraordinary people."
In pictures
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