HURLOCK — At a recent meeting, members of the Hurlock Lions Club presented North Dorchester High School seniors Ava Gomez and Harvey Williamson with Bill Brown Memorial Scholarships valued at $2,000 each. Both Ava and Harvey have strong records of service.

Ava is a member of numerous honor societies and has participated in highway cleanups, blood drives and fundraisers for the Ronald McDonald House Charities. She plans to attend Chesapeake College next year with the goal of pursuing a career as a dental hygienist.

Harvey has been a member of the North Dorchester High School golf and lacrosse teams and has volunteered with Ducks Unlimited, Ruritan, and the Waterfowl Festival. He will attend the Lake Area Technical College in South Dakota to become a diesel technician.

The Hurlock Lions Club wishes Ava and Harvey well in their educational and are happy that we can support them.
The 41 men and women who make up the Hurlock Lions Club are members of Lions International, the world’s largest service organization. Lions International boasts nearly 1.4 million members in 49,000 local clubs found in over 200 countries.
The scholarship was established in 1995 to support students with both need and a record of service. Beginning in the 2016-17 academic year, the scholarship was renamed the Bill Brown Memorial Scholarship to honor longtime member, Bill Brown after his untimely passing in the Spring of 2016.

Bill was a Lion, Little League coach, church leader, mentor, husband, and father. He lived the Lions motto, “WE SERVE” and was always looking to help those around him and to improve his community. To date, the Hurlock Lions Club has awarded $103,000 to deserving North Dorchester students.
Prior to COVID, the scholarship was supported by an annual buffet dinner which was catered by Joyce Spratt for 25 years. Since COVID, it has been supported by an annual barbecue chicken lunch.

The now famous Hurlock Lions Club chicken barbecue is a fundraiser started by Bill Brown, who was also a chicken farmer, who wanted to raise money, feed people, and promote the poultry industry one meal at a time.
This year, almost 60 members and volunteers contributed 115 hours to plan, shop, cook, assemble, deliver and clean up after the barbecue; 650 dinners were delivered to 48 businesses locally and as far away as Denton, Easton, Oxford, Cambridge, Church Creek and Vienna. We are grateful for the support of our many customers and Mountaire Farms, who donated the chicken.
While there are larger scholarships, many funded by endowments, the Hurlock Lions Bill Brown Memorial Scholarship is special because so many people value the cause enough to donate their time and energy to support it each year.