Birthday honour for Joan | Coffs Coast News | Local News in Coffs Coast

Joan Howlett enjoys a quiet moment with her Siamese cat Choo Choo.

Rob Wright

JOAN Howlett will receive the medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) in today’s Australia Day honours.

But Joan will also be celebrating her 81st birthday today and her proud daughter has put the Australian flag on the party invitations.

The impressive list of achievements that accompany Mrs Howlett’s OAM do not convey the warmth, practical Christianity and ever-present sense of fun that characterise the snowy-haired grandmother.

It was typical of Mrs Howlett that she vetted that list and sent it back for corrections because she considered they had exaggerated her contribution at several points.

Asked for her initial response to the award she said: “I was embarrassed. Other people do as much as I do.”

“I was also surprised and very excited – and my whole family was overseas and I couldn’t tell anyone.

“It has really been my privilege to work with beautiful people – everything you do is a team effort – even a family is a team effort.

Thinking of team efforts led her to recall the work that kept her busy as a young woman – retouching photographs and negatives, including team photos.

Joan Howlett is being recognised today for service to the community of Coffs Harbour over 42 years and to youth through the Guiding movement for 46 years.

A long-serving member of the Uniting Church’s Coffs Harbour Church Council and Elders Committee, she has been a committee member of Coffs Harbour Soup Kitchen since 199, and a Pastoral Care worker since 1999.

Like a slow-motion version of the miracle of the loaves and fishes, she has seen ‘the Soupie’ grow from crock-pot of soup and a load of bread cut into sandwiches to a project which feeds hundreds of people each week.

She was the founding co-ordinator of the Church’s ‘crisis room’ in 1999 and was instrumental in establishing weekly visits by Legal Aid to assist the clients in 2007.

Mrs Howlett has co-ordinated the bi-monthly morning teas at the Shearwater Lodge Cancer Treatment Centre since 2007, and volunteers at the Cancer Council’s ‘Daffodil Day’.

A site supervisor for Clean Up Australia Day; a notable youth leader and singer, Mrs Howlett is also a member of the Coffs Harbour Choir.

Her interests in music, education, self-reliance and community service came together in her work for the Girl Guides. She has been involved with Guiding since 1964, taking many major roles in that organisation.

Although she is no longer an active leader, she has been a Member of the Trefoil Guild of senior women involved with Guides since 1983 and still helps with Guiding events and activities.

Joan Howlett will be presented with her insignia, the actual Medal of the Order of Australia at formal ceremony in Sydney in April or May.

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