-Photo by Terry Miller
By Susan Motander
On Friday January 31, Pam Fitzpatrick will receive the Iris Award. Given by the Monrovia Chamber of Commerce, the award is considered the equivalent of other cities’ Person of the Year Awards. The only surprise in Fitzpatrick receiving the award is that she had not been given it earlier.
As she tells the story, in 1991 her sister Jennifer had to bend her arm back to open “a little store” here in Monrovia. “She had already made me move here, and I was a single mother struggling as an independent toy designer. I really didn’t want to open a shop.”
But Jennifer prevailed and “The Dollmakers opened in 900 square feet on Lemon Avenue in what Pam called “A beautiful little town, but you could have shot a cannon off on the main street and not injured anyone.” But Pam and the little shop survived. The shop grew and moved and Pam increased her involvement in the “beautiful little town.”
“When you move to Monrovia, everything is contagious,” she explained. You cannot come here and not want to make things better, to do something,”
And she has done things. “I started being invited to things and I dragged my family along and hopefully I taught my children to volunteer. I now have my 10-year-old grandson going to city council meetings and YMCA board meetings with me.”
“We all started connecting with the community,” she said. “In those early days I am sure I stepped on a lot of toes, but I have learned when to shut up and when to speak up…at least most of the time,’ she admitted.
And she has spoken up, but never without volunteering not just her opinion, but also her time and money. The list of everything Fitzpatrick has done is too long to list, but here is the reader’s digest condensed version: Chamber of Commerce (president in 1995 and now a board member), Boys and Girls Club ( a founding board member, Community Service Commission, Merchants Association which led to the Mayor’s Old Town Advisory Board (serving on both), the Merchants Co-op Committee, Board of Santa Anita Family Services, Monrovia Kiwanis and the list goes on.
She even chairs the New Years Eve Event on Myrtle Avenue.
Pam recounted that this year in addition to the Iris Award she received recognition as the Small Business Person of the Year Award and the Person of the Year from the YMCA. She joked that one friend has asked if she had some sort of terminal illness that she was suddenly being honored by so many (the answer is she is fine).
Asked what she loved most her simple answer was “My family, my God and my Monrovia, the order doesn’t matter because there isn’t a conflict.”
