Like a Tennessee Williams scenario, Tuesday, October 18, was warm and steamy. Luckily, the Crystal Charity Ball types were well aware of the condition and left the cashmeres and leathers at home for the Gentlemen’s Night Out.
It was to thank the CCB husbands for playing second fiddle, while their wives called on foundations and CEOs to provide $5.6M for children charities.
Presented by BB&T Bank, the event took place at Tracy and Kent Rathbun’s home. Because of the limited parking, most guests parked at the Junior League of Dallas and were bused over to the Rathbuns. Others had friends or Uber deliver them to the front door. Nicky Oates dropped off wife Debbie Oates and Marie Dean depended upon a walker for her mending left foot.
Dwight Emanuelson was back in town from a couple of weeks on the East Coast. In addition to company gatherings, Dwight headed to Hilton Head to help his dad with post-Hurricane Matthew damages. After a couple of days and hand blisters, dad’s home was soon back to normal. The remaining problems for the seaside house was the damage to the dunes that separated his dad’s pool from the ocean.
Since the Rathbun home is a true-blue indoor/outdoor party palace, the ladies were all gussied up in silk and lace attire especially as presenting sponsor rep BB&T’s newly minted North Texas Region President Rob Bowlby addressed the group about BB&T’s capability. As if moving the Bowlby family to Dallas from Florida wasn’t taxing enough, Rob’s wife, Sarah Bowlby, had just given birth six weeks before. But there she was, looking great.
Rob admitted that he was indeed impressed with the philanthropic efforts of North Texas. Why, just the previous Saturday he had seen Kent on stage raising funds for cancer research. Now, Kent was hosting another fundraiser.