Well-read Greensburg book club marks 125th anniversary

You can look at book clubs as outmoded relics of the pre-digital past or as an activity that's trending again in the age of instant information and short attention spans.

The Friday Club of Greensburg transcends both views.

Founded in 1892, the group will celebrate its 125th anniversary with a luncheon and program June 17 at Vallozzi's Restaurant in Hempfield.

What gives the Friday Club its staying power?

“We have a group of women who are very diverse, but have similar interests in reading and other intellectual endeavors, and that's what makes the group jell,” says current president Alice Kaylor of Greensburg, who's also dean of studies at St. Vincent College.

It's been that way since the beginning.

Club archives, which have been meticulously kept over the years, show that the group organized as a literary club with 20 charter members for the purpose of “social and mental improvement.”

Nowadays, active membership is capped at 30. Once in, membership is for life, though anyone who can no longer participate because of ill health or relocation is moved to associate membership status.

Until a few weeks ago, members thought they had the oldest women's book club in the country but, while doing research for the anniversary event, they found that they're possibly No. 2.

“There were women's book clubs that started in the 1860s. These were outshoots of the Progressive Era when we were into reform and urbanization, mechanization, immigration, many causes for social reform,” Kaylor says. “These women's clubs formed for the purpose of social and personal improvement, and that's exactly the mission of the Friday Club.

“The Ladies' Reading Club of Houston started in 1885. As we've learned, they are still in existence,” she says.

“We're not the oldest, but we're certainly one of the oldest,” member and anniversary event planner Georgia Unkovic of Greensburg says.

Members found the anniversary to be significant enough that they also wanted to make their story public for the first time, says member Linda Austin of Greensburg, who's also helping to plan the celebration.

“In the beginning days, if you were a Friday, the only time you were allowed to mention it publicly was in your obituary. It was the only time you saw a Friday in the paper,” she says.

“You could mention it to your friends, but you didn't spout it publicly,” Unkovic adds. “It was just a quiet thing that people did.”

Perhaps the way membership is conferred has something to do with keeping it quiet, Austin says, noting a 2005 Wall Street Journal article she had read on a phenomenon labeled the “book club snub.”

The term refers to the proliferation of private book clubs that take a kind of perverse delight in maintaining their exclusivity by rejecting even celebrity A-listers.

The Fridays say limiting membership is not about snobbery but about keeping group size manageable and maintaining its friendly but intellectually challenging atmosphere.

“When we have an opening, members are invited to bring guests to meetings, so people can get to know them and see if they'd be a nice fit with the rest of the group,” Kaylor says.

After that, there's a voting process in which a candidate must be approved by a formula that basically equates to a two-thirds majority.

“Often people are put up for membership and we fail to elect a new member,” Unkovic says. “It's not that somebody's not wanted, it's just that the votes are too spread out over the candidates. Sometimes we'll have five people nominated for one spot, and it's difficult to get that two-thirds.”

Club members meet from 10 to 14 times a year, from fall to spring. Meetings start with “roll call,” in which each woman present is given two minutes to describe a recent book she's read.

Together, members read and discuss two fiction and two nonfiction books each year. Other meetings are devoted to programs on special topics or an occasional field trip.

Members do not participate as a group in volunteer work or in social or political causes or debates.

“Our primary initiative is to give a gift to the (Greensburg Hempfield Area Library) every year,” Kaylor says.

When a member dies, the club also gives a book to the library as a memorial. Both of these gifts are funded through dues.

Current members come from various personal and professional backgrounds and range in age from “under 55 into the 90s,” says Unkovic, one of the younger members.

“The reason I joined, I'd come to the meetings and all these women were 80 and 90, and they were reading and they were vibrant,” she says. “They'd traveled and seen things and they'd share.

“I was pretty young at the time and I was so impressed by these older ladies who were so sharp. They did some heavy duty reading — I don't read half as well as they did at 95.”

The club's longevity has been noted by a proclamation from the Westmoreland County Commissioners and congratulatory letters from the Westmoreland County Historical Society and Cesare Muccari, executive director of the Westmoreland County Federated Library System.

Still, the June 17 celebration will have members looking to the future.

“We're doing a skit from a future meeting, imagining a meeting from the year 2067,” Unkovic says.

They hope the club is still going strong then.

Shirley McMarlin is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach her at 724-836-5750, smcmarlin@tribweb.com or via Twitter @shirley_trib.