The gift is about a commitment made a long time ago to make the world a better place, and it’s that same commitment that Girl Scouts instilled in Margaret Pickard Sirvis, according to her daughter Barb Sirvis.
Girl Scouts – North Carolina Coastal Pines (GS-NCCP) recently notified WIZS News that a $300,000 gift from the Margaret Pickard Sirvis Fund will go towards revitalizing Camp Graham, just north of Henderson. Be sure to click here for Camp Graham details.
A lifelong Girl Scout and advocate for women, Margaret Pickard Sirvis, or “Peggy” as she was known by her Girl Scout friends, passed away on April 8, 2017 at 93 years old. Peggy’s daughter Barb worked with GS–NCCP staff to create a legacy gift to support improvements to Peggy’s beloved Camp Graham.
Information provided by GS–NCCP indicates the $300,000 gift will go towards much needed facilities renovations that will enable Camp Graham to continue providing valuable outdoor leadership opportunities to girls across North Carolina, just as it had for Peggy 80+ years earlier. Renovations will include things like a new HVAC, a full-enclosed bathhouse, updates to cabin units, and much more.
Barb Sirvis told WIZS News in a phone interview that her mother Peggy was very clear she wanted to make sure the Girl Scouts received a generous gift at her death, so the $300,000 came from Peggy’s estate. Barb said Girl Scouts had always been very important to her mother Peggy, as she was in scouting some 75 years.
“She loved camp,” Bard said. “She wanted to make sure her gift would continue to provide camp opportunities for Girl Scouts today and into the future.”
When asked how Camp Graham was chosen, Barb said, “My mother was born and raised in Chapel Hill, and she went to camp as a girl at a camp that no longer exists, but she did go to Girl Scout camp as a girl, and she also watched the power of Girl Scouting to shape my life and the camp experience and the life-long friendships that I made at camp. Then, when she moved back to North Carolina in 2006, a local Girl Scout friend took us to an event with Girl Scouts of North Carolina Coastal Pines, and there (Peggy) had a chance to talk to some of the staff about her interests, and they were doing a new project at Camp Graham building tree houses. She said she wanted to see them, and she went to camp, and she fell in love with Camp Graham.”
Peggy told her daughter Barb she wanted to spend some money on this council, that she wanted to leave money to make sure the camp stays here for girls in the future.
It turns out that Peggy was very quiet about her ability to leave a gift like this for Girl Scouts, so by all accounts it had a wow effect, just by the amount alone of $300,000 if nothing else.
It’s the personal side that tells the rest of the story.
Barb Sirvis said, “She and my dad met in 1944 and were married in 1945. They each had a dream. His dream was to be an entrepreneur, and her dream was to make the world a better place. They brought those two dreams together. He eventually started his own business, and she was the home and corporate treasurer. They managed wisely and lived modestly their whole life.”
As far as how the money will be used, GS–NCCP went to Barb with a proposal with several options in it. Barb said the renovations and improvements mentioned “were the ones that spoke to me.” She said these priorities were on the top of their list, and “I thought they would be on the top of my mom’s list.”