Senior models embrace creative — and risque — moneymaker

PALMER — Sporting fishnets, feather boas and fur coats, local seniors are again strutting their stuff in this year’s edition of the Mat-Su Senior Services’ “Naughty but Nice” calendar.

Initiated by Donna Harding in 2012, the project was designed as a general fundraiser for the Palmer center. According to a 2014 article on seniorvoicealaska.com, Harding was inspired by the 2003 movie “Calendar Girls” to show what a “lively, active and fun group” of seniors are affiliated with the Palmer center.

Dee Brown was the first to help Harding find models within the organization who fit the theme of a given calendar. For this year’s product, since Harding has retired, it was up to Brown to decide all the details of who, what, when and where.

“I had gone to an antique car show in downtown Palmer a year ago and thought, ‘wouldn’t it be neat if we could use some of these cars … in our calendar,’” Brown said.

With encouragement from her children, Brown approached representatives from the 49th State Street Rodders Association with the idea last summer. The word went out and before long Brown had 10 motorists willing to volunteer their classic cars for the cause: Dennis Allen, Tom Cresap, John Holcomb, Jane Ann Aldich, Art Isham, Fred Keller (also featured in the calendar himself), Bill Tull, Michael Wiedmer (also a contributing photographer) and Michael Wood.

Tull, a longtime Alaskan from Palmer, volunteered his 1953 green Packard convertible for the July photo with Harding and Edythe Ekstedt. Tull said his convertible has been featured in a previous calendar (though he couldn’t recall the specific year or theme), as well as in the 49th State Street shows and the Alaska State Fair parades.

As a Mat-Su Senior Services member, Tull was “aware of what’s happening out there” in the senior community, and was “glad to help” raise money in such a unique way.

“It was fun,” Tull said. “I’m always trying to help them out where I can.”

Once the cars and models had been selected for the calendar, it was just a matter of finding the outfits to fit the era in which each car was made — an easy task for a woman like Brown.

“I think she carries clothes in her car for things like this,” said Mat-Su Senior Services board president Janet Beeter, who borrowed a hat from Brown for a 2015 calendar photo shoot.

But Brown — featured in this year’s March and November calendar photos — isn’t the only model able to supply items from her own wardrobe.

Patti Gersich, the January 2016 model, wears a red “New Year’s Eve” dress in the photo, which she bought 10 or 15 years ago, she said.

“Dee told us to dress fancy and I thought, ‘Well this dress’ll be perfect,” Gersich said.

She wasn’t sure her little crimson number would fit at first, but she wouldn’t have to look far for a back up — Brown had supplied Gersich with modeling outfits before for the annual Pioneers Style Show, as well as for previous calendar shoots.

“It’s so nice to be asked to be a part of something like that,” Gersich said. “It’s quite a nice experience.”

And it’s attracting more and more attention from the public, she said.

“It’s a popular item,” Gersich said. “People are asking about the next calendar now wondering what theme we’re gonna have next year.”

Although Brown has been trying to retire from things like the calendar and Dee Tours, her volunteer tour guide service for seniors — “this takes a lot of time and effort,” she said in an earlier interview — Gersich said she hopes the project will continue.

That seems likely with sentiments like that of 2016 March model Phyllis Moore, who said she’s been waiting for years to be in the calendar — though she’s worked in the senior center kitchen for 12 years, she didn’t turn 60 until last year, which is the minimum age for membership.

“Everybody wants to be in the calendar,” Moore said. “It brings people out and brings people close.”

The 2016 Mat-Su Senior Services calendar is for sale at many Palmer businesses, Brown said, including Three Bears (Trunk Road), Fireside Books, Nonessentials or Bionic Chiropractic.

Contact reporter Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.