CC Pythian Sister elected to top office

Nancy Hall named ‘Supreme Chief’ in international service organization

By Kate Hayden | khayden@charlescitypress.com

It took Nancy Hall of Charles City ten years to work her way through the organization’s offices, but when she arrives in Des Moines today for the state Pythian Sisters convention, she’ll be representing as the organization’s Supreme Chief for 2016-18 –– the presiding officer over U.S. and Canadian Temples.

“They start out on the local level, where the presiding office is Most Excellent Chief, and the Grand Chief is state level,” Hall said. “We had an organization in Italy for a couple of years, but they fell by the wayside. We’re working on getting another temple over in Italy.”

As the Supreme Chief, Hall will head an advisory board and law committee of the organization and travel for Pythian Sisters conferences across the states and provinces: this year in September and October, she’s planning to visit Maryland, Washington, Virginia and Oregon.

Hall has previously served in district and state offices through the 1980s, was elected as a representative of national conventions and committees in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and in 2006 was elected as Supreme Guard in Halifax, Nova Scotia in Canada.

Hall was installed as Supreme Chief in Beachwood, Ohio on Aug. 10 and will serve until 2018.

Hall, who was raised in Floyd County, joined Charles City Temple #84 in 1972 when she moved into town.

“We had over 100 members,” she recalled.

The chapter was first founded in 1897 and met above a business across from Central Park until Charles City’s 1968 tornado, when it was moved to Rolsing Street. Now, the 23 Charles City Pythian Sisters meet in Hall’s home.

Pythian Sisters is a service organization first founded in 1888 as disaster response and support, Hall said, and as an affiliate of the Knights of Pythias.

“If there was a catastrophe, a fire, we would step in and help the families out in whatever means we can,” Hall said.

Now, “we do national projects. My project is diabetes, and encouraging the sisters to support diabetes however they can.”

Hall sells a lighthouse pin and donates the profits to Camp Hertko Hollow, a summer program based out of Boone, Iowa that offers children with diabetes a camp experience with specialty medical staff also teaching them how to live with their diabetes. Other sisters and chapters have supported causes such as heart illness, Special Olympics and members of the military, Hall said.

-20160825-