Angel of Hope: This pillar of Kure Beach thrives by paying kindnesses forward
By Linda L. LeakeCarolina Beach news * Kure Beach news * Pleasure Island events * Monkey Junction news * Pleasure Island Politics * Carolina Beach politics
It was Friday, August 18, 2006 and Doris Eakes was on the road early. By 7:30 a.m. she had made her way from Big Daddy’s restaurant in Kure Beach to Wilmington. Tears streamed down Eakes’s cheeks as the white 2002 Cadillac Escalade she was riding in accelerated onto Interstate 40. Several police motorcycles from the New Hanover County Sheriff’s Department and a Kure Beach patrol car led the way with lights flashing and sirens wailing. To add to the commotion, the mayors of Kure beach, Carolina Beach and Wilmington, all riding motorcycles, surrounded Eakes’s vehicle.
Was this woman being thrown out of town, you ask?
Hardly.
With this landmark road trip, Doris Eakes was fulfilling a little dream of her own with the hopes of helping others in a big way.
As Eakes headed west across North Carolina that gray, overcast Friday morning with her special friend, Harold Cutler, she was also in the company of some 25 additional motorcycle riders, including her son-in-law, Todd Glasser. She was hosting her most recent brainchild, the First Annual Trinity Children Charity Ride. Destination: Freedom Hill Estates, Eakes’s 50-acre property near Townsend, Tennessee.
By the way, those were unabashed tears of joy Eakes shed as she saw her project coming to fruition in the midst of a glorious official escort to the interstate highway. True to the theme of the event, she and countless Tarheel and Volunteer State allies were finally “building dreams from the sea to the mountains.”
“It was very humbling to have a dream and see it all unfold,” Eakes says. “The remarkable thing is that it was late April this year before the Trinity Children board of directors finally formalized a plan for the ride and mid-May before work actually got underway.”
On June 23, 2005 Eakes had established Trinity Children Foundation (TCF) as a publicly supported, charitable, tax-exempt organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.
“Through faith, hope and love, Trinity Children is committed to providing support for children in the United States, India and Africa,” says Eakes, the TCF president. “We want to serve orphans, underprivileged children and at risk children by addressing food, clothing, shelter, and health care issues while providing emotional stability. Trinity Children is all about finding a need and filling it, one act of kindness at a time.”
Thought-provoking roadblock
While not a biker herself, the innovative Eakes conceived the notion of hosting a charity ride for TCF in December 2005. She had just attended the 8:30 a.m. service and Sunday school at First Christian Church in Wilmington, where she has been a member since 1958, and was waiting to exit right out of the parking lot. But it would be a full 45 minutes before the way was clear to make the turn on to Oleander Drive.
It seems a large group of motorcycle riders was passing through Wilmington that day. While watching the leather-clad travelers drive by her church, Eakes thought about the reputation Harley-Davidson enthusiasts had for supporting worthy causes.
“Maybe bikers would help my favorite charity,” she said to herself.
Eakes’s desire to help others can be traced to her formative years in Beaufort County, where she grew up with her brother, C.H., Jr., and sisters Betty and Barbara. Her parents, Carmer and Necy Wallace, raised cattle, hogs, corn and tobacco on a 160-acre farm near Pinetown, North Carolina.
Eakes credits her dad’s example for her igniting her citizenship and leadership skills. Carmer Wallace was a driving force in establishing telephone service and the Rural Electric Power Company in Beaufort, Hyde and Terrell Counties. In 1948 he was instrumental in helping the founder of Roanoke Bible College establish that institution in Elizabeth City, North Carolina, and for many years he served as chairman of the Beaufort County school board. Not bad for a small town country gentleman with only a third grade education.
“When my dad was 18, he broke his leg, and it wasn’t set correctly so it didn’t heal properly,” Eakes relates. “Because of that injury, he was rejected for military service during World War II. He always said be wanted to do something to serve his country and he found many ways to do so. My dad had a dynamic personality and I guess I inherited some of that.”
Early role model
Eakes’s first major life altering experience occurred when she was just four years old. She developed peritonitis and was hospitalized for 100 days and 100 nights. Her condition appeared so hopeless that, at one point, she heard the doctor tell her parents, “she’s leaving here.” The irrepressible little patient quickly responded, “I’m not going anywhere.”
During her hospital stay, Eakes was cared for by a young nurse named Miss Albrighten. “She was so wonderful and I wanted to be like her,” Eakes says.
So after graduating from Bath High School in 1956, Doris enrolled that fall in the nursing program at James Walker Memorial Hospital, which operated from 1923 to 1966 on Red Cross Street in Wilmington.
By chance Doris encountered a life-changing career roadblock on November 15, 1956. That day she met a tall, handsome Air Force recruit named Joe Eakes, a Maryville, Tennessee native who was stationed at Fort Fisher as a radar operator.
After a whirlwind 30-day courtship, Joe and Doris were married by a justice of the peace in Conway, South Carolina on December 16.
Unfortunately, there was an unfathomable rule in those days that a woman couldn’t be in nursing school if she was married, so the aforementioned bride was tossed out of school and compelled to sacrifice her initial dream.
“Since I couldn’t finish my training, Joe kept joking ‘I've saved humanity from you,’” Doris quips. "I did not see the humor in it, at the time."
Fortunately, that archaic rule was changed around June 1957.
“But by then I didn’t have the money or drive to go back to school,” Doris says.
So she never became a nurse. But that doesn’t mean she would never care for or inspire others, like Miss Albrighten had cared for and inspired her.
Baby on board
In the spring of 1964 the Eakes adopted a baby girl they named Carmen after Doris’s dad. In September that year they headed for a 12- month stint in the Philippines, their first international travel.
Joe stayed in the Air Force until 1972, and Doris accompanied him to most of his various assignments, which, after the Philippines, included Marietta, Georgia and Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina.
The entrepreneurial spirit that would come to epitomize Joe and Doris first started to sprout in 1964. Joe had been reading about retirement centers and he thought they might be a viable business option.
“I thought he was crazy,” Doris recalls. "He was always ahead of his time, marching to a different drummer."
Doris actually had an opportunity to acquire related job experience that would soon prove useful beyond her wildest dreams. When Joe was stationed in Thailand from May 1968 to May 1969, Doris and Carmen stayed with her parents on the family farm. During that time, Doris worked as a bookkeeper at an assisted living center in Chocowinity, never dreaming she’d own any such facilities one day.
“I learned what to do and what not to do when running this type of business,” Doris says. “It was my college education.”
Despite Doris’s initial misgivings, the Eakes purchased a motel in Pleasant Hill, North Carolina when Joe returned from Thailand. After completing some renovations, they opened it as an assisted living center for 66 residents on February 8, 1970.
They continued to develop similar facilities, and by 1992 they owned and operated 22 assisted living centers with capacity for 12 to 133 residents throughout North Carolina and Virginia. Doris still owns seven of the centers, and all are currently leased to various individuals and management organizations.
Expanding their business horizons
By 1980, after some 10 years away from the beach, the Eakes were living at Fort Fisher (in a house that would eventually wash away in 1996 during Hurricane Fran).
On Thursday, March 14, 1981, Joe and Doris went to have a drink at the former Crow’s Nest, now Freddie’s Italian Restaurant. That evening at the bar, a friend pulled Joe aside and asked if he was interested in purchasing “the biggest business on island.”
“That’s Big Daddy’s,” Joe replied, “and it’s not for sale.”
Turns out the Kure Beach landmark was for sale.
“We don’t need a restaurant,” Doris protested.
Nonetheless, on Monday, March 18, 1981 the court awarded the Eakes the right to purchase the business, and plans were made to open Big Daddy’s four days later, Friday, March 22.
On Wednesday, March 20, the novice restaurateurs learned they needed a liquor license, which requires background checks.
“I called the New Hanover County Sheriff’s Department and told them we’ve never done anything wrong, except for an occasional speeding ticket,” Doris relates. “So they agreed to expedite the process and sign the necessary papers right away.”
At 1 p.m. on Friday, March 22, Doris left for Raleigh to take the signed liquor license papers to the Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) office. As the clock struck 5 p.m., the ABC representatives were just finishing an inspection of Big Daddy’s liquor supply, while Doris was speeding back from Raleigh with a liquor license in hand. Fortunately, she didn’t get a ticket and the restaurant opened as scheduled with full bar service.
Doris still owns Big Daddy’s and it is still the flagship business of Kure Beach, thanks to the able leadership of Gerald Huffman, who has been manager since the Eakes purchased the popular dining spot 25 years ago.
“Gerald is extremely professional and maintains a consistent quality of food,” Doris says. “That’s the key to our success with the restaurant.”
Doris is also quick to credit Susan W. Stevenson, comptroller for Eakes Investment Company, LLC (EIC), whose dedicated service and personal friendship since 1973 afforded the Eakes the freedom to keep moving on to new projects.
“Our endeavors are possible because of teamwork,” Doris insists.
From 1981 to 1983 the Eakes also owned and operated the historic Country Squire in Kenansville, and from 1983 to 1999 EIC owned and operated the former Fisherman’s Galley, now Jack Mackeral's, located across from Big Daddy’s.
Bountiful blessings
Being intelligent, aggressive and forward-thinking business professionals, it’s no surprise the Eakes reaped significant monetary rewards throughout their careers. They used their resources to invest in real estate, build and buy beautiful homes and enjoy extensive first-class travel throughout the world in the company of fellow movers and shakers like Richard Nixon and Tony Robbins.
Being spiritual, generous people, the Eakes have also seized, not to mention created, opportunities to share their bounty with others.
It was a bit of serendipity that drew Doris into the Eakes’s first major philanthropy. One ordinary Sunday morning during the spring of 1982, Doris was en route from her then home at Fort Fisher to First Christian Church. As the story goes, Joe declined to accompany her that Sunday, and for some unknown reason, Doris, somewhat perturbed because of it, kept on driving past First Christian. Two and a half hours later she was parked outside Rosemary Church of Christ, her hometown place of worship in Washington, North Carolina. She was just in time for the 11 o’clock service.
That Sunday, a young ministry student about to graduate from Roanoke Bible College spoke about life and the church in India, his home country. His name was Ajai Lall, and his wife, Indu, was with him.
Lall shared his dream of establishing a mission in central India. He mentioned that, for a contribution of $40 per month, it was possible to cover the living expenses of an Indian minister and his family.
After the service, Doris shook Lall’s hand and greeted him warmly. “I enjoyed your presentation,” she said. “I’ll take 2½ ministers. Where do I send the money?”
With Doris’s urging, Joe was agreeable to help support Lall’s efforts, and when Lall founded Central India Christian Mission (CICM) later in 1982, the Eakes immediately became two of the organization’s most generous and loyal benefactors.
With their help, CICM has established more than 500 churches and a 50-bed hospital that serves 1.2 million adults and children. Several medical camps are provided each month for the tribal areas. And an orphanage with capacity for 50 children is being expanded to include 200.
In 2002, with financial support from Doris, CICM established the Doris Eakes Academy of Nursing, a dental school and a Bible college.
“Trinity Children Foundation is currently helping to complete the orphanage in central India and build a second home to house 200 children orphaned by the 2004 tsunami on India’s southern shore,” Doris mentions.
Joe and Doris continued to thrive, share their blessings and enjoy life together until July 7, 1992, when Joe passed away unexpectedly.
Author, author
On July 11, 1992, which would have been Joe’s 55th birthday, Doris celebrated her love for him by penning a poem entitled “Memorial to Joe.” In 2005 she compiled a book of her original poems, called Voices of the Heart. It includes Joe’s tribute, plus a work called “A Boy from India,” inspired by Lall’s life. (www.thevoicesoftheheart.com)
Doris’s second book, Whispered Messages, also self-published in 2005, includes essays about strange and unique experiences she has had. In fact, she’s running a contest related to this book. She’s inviting everyone to submit stories about their own uncanny experiences until February 2007. After that, based on the decision of seven impartial judges, Doris will award cash prizes of $2,500, $1,000 and $500 to the authors of the best stories.
(Contest details are located at www.whisperedmessages.com.)
Not surprisingly, 40% of all Doris’s book sales are donated to TCF.
Scholarships
On June 13, 2000, Doris celebrated her own birthday and honored her beloved Joe by forming a $4.2 million charitable remainder trust to provide a total of some 40 annual endowed scholarships for students at Beaufort Community College (BCC), Roanoke Bible College (RBC), Maryville College, and Cape Fear Community College (CFCC). To honor her dad, she named the BCC and RBC offerings the Wallace Eakes Scholarships.
In keeping with her personal and career interests, Doris earmarks the scholarships for ministry, business and nursing students exclusively. Doris's support provides scholarships for more than 20 CFCC students each year who enroll in allied health programs and other business-related vocational and technical programs, according to Eric McKeithan, CFCC president.
“Many of these students would not be able to attend college without Doris’s generosity,” McKeithan points out. “Doris has a special place in her heart for nurses because she once wanted to be one.”
In recognition of her considerable gifts to CFCC, the Board of Trustees marked the occasion of Doris's June 13, 2000 birthday by naming CFCC's renowned nursing programs the Doris Wallace Eakes School of Nursing.
Each fall McKeithan drives the CFCC bus to Big Daddy’s so the scholarship winners can meet their benefactor and enjoy a gala dinner. With the hope of inspiring them to serve as guardian angels for others, Doris has also established the tradition of presenting each student with a Willow Tree collectible angel as a memento.
“Doris is unequivocal in her ability and willingness to provide all she can for others within her means,” McKeithan says. “She’s one of the most altruistic people I have ever run across and is so motivated to help others with her time, efforts and financial resources. She has a heart of gold and is constantly striving to expand her circle of caring.”
Paying forward
The only repayment Doris asks of her scholarship winners is that, when the time is right and they have the means, they bestow kindnesses on three people. In fact, the students are required to sign a contract saying they will honor this commitment.
“I was inspired to create this requirement after reading Pay it Forward by Catherine Ryan Hyde,” Doris explains. “My hope is that the three people each student helps will provide favors for three additional people, and this positive momentum will continue to ebb and flow throughout the world.”
During the presentation of the scholarship endowment to CFCC on June 13, 2000, Ryan Hyde was on hand to sign copies of the aforementioned book that inspires Doris.
Gift of music
On a musical note, in 2003 Doris donated some $70,000 to CFCC for the purchase of a stunning new Steinway grand piano.
“With a CFCC faculty member playing on the Steinway, I had the pleasure of having the first dance with Doris when her gift was announced,” McKeithan relates. “That same evening, the CFCC Board of Trustees announced its naming of the beautiful three-story atrium in the McKeithan Center at CFCC's North Campus in her honor.”
According to McKeithan, it is believed that Doris's donation of funds for the instrument made CFCC the only institution in New Hanover County to actually own a Steinway grand piano, at least at the time of the donation.
“It is a novel event for pianists and piano students to have access to a Steinway grand, making Doris's gift all the more special for CFCC music students and faculty members,” McKeithan emphasizes. “The piano is also played at various CFCC events held at the North Campus, including pinning ceremonies for the graduates of many of the college's allied health programs and various receptions honoring donors who provide scholarships for CFCC students.”
That CFCC owned a Steinway grand piano was at the heart of a partnership forged between CFCC and Chamber Music Wilmington, a group that sponsors several chamber music concerts each year in the area. Each concert is attended by hundreds of local citizens, and prior to most concerts, CFCC's music students and faculty are invited to
open rehearsals at the North Campus with these artists.
“Who could have imagined that Doris's one-time gift of this piano would be of benefit to and enjoyed by so many thousands of people, both now and for generations to come?” McKeithan wonders. “Doris would. That’s the kind of long term vision she has in so many undertakings.”
Helping abused children
The beneficiary of the proceeds of the recent TCF Charity Ride is the non-profit High Point-based Children's Advocacy Centers of North Carolina (CACNC), an umbrella over 25 affiliate organizations throughout the state, including Wilmington’s Carousel Center, all of which are part of the National Children's Alliance.
All CACNC affiliates coordinate a multidisciplinary investigation of child abuse, including provision of forensic interviews, social services, law enforcement and prosecution. Services also include medical exams and mental health counseling or referrals for both.
“With our programs, the agencies come to the children in one child-friendly place, rather than the children having to go to several different agencies,” says Cathy Purvis, CACNC executive director.
In 2005, CACNC served 6,000 abused children, and provided educational programs about abuse to 20,259 children via schools and community organizations.
Moreover, according to Purvis, the total number of children served by the CACNC in 2005 was a 143% increase over 2004. In comparing specific services rendered in 2005 to 2004, the number of forensic interviews conducted increased 133%, therapy hours increased 181%, medical exams increased 256% and specialized training of law enforcement personnel, district attorneys and child protective services personnel increased 179%.
“Our needs are huge and they increase all the time, while community financial support is getting harder to come by,” Purvis emphasizes. “The money generated by the Charity Ride will help purchase critical resources like medical equipment and interview recording equipment, and fund educational programs, that we would not have otherwise been able to afford.”
“Doris is remarkable in that she did a lot of research on our programs, so she is very knowledgeable about our work and our needs,” Purvis says. “She cares so much about children and we are tremendously grateful for her support.”
The end of the road is only the beginning
The First Annual Trinity Children Charity Ride was a great success, Doris reports. Under the guidance of ride captain Greg Pratt, chief of North Carolina Project Lifesaver, about 33 riders with assorted makes of bikes participated in the two-day trip, with an overnight stop in Hickory, North Carolina. Music, food, festivities and fun abounded from the start at the North Carolina sea to the finish in the Tennessee mountains. Doris hired a local movie production company, so all the wonderful memories are captured on film. Thanks to donations by the riders, a silent auction and a raffle for a Harley Davidson Street Bob, a whopping $53,000 was raised to build dreams for CACNC.
“Everybody had a ball and we have received a lot of compliments,” Doris says. “One person said ‘I have been on many rides in my life, but never one as organized as this.’ We are already looking forward to next year’s ride and the opportunity to raise even more money for children in need.”
# # # #
What to pay some kindness forward and help Doris Eakes with her charitable endeavors? For more information, check out www.trinitychildren.com.
