Fifteen years have passed since the first Turning Point auction, but as the nearly 400 people who showed up at John Evans Inn in Crystal Lake last weekend proved, the event is as strong as ever.
With about 300 items — including dinners, vacations, museum memberships, golf packages and sports memorabilia — up for bid in both a silent auction and a live auction, the evening raised about $30,000. It will be used to augment the public funding the McHenry County-based organization receives to counsel victims and perpetrators of domestic violence and sexual assault.
For Ellen Hamilton of Woodstock, a member of the Turning Point board of directors and the auction’s co-chairman, the goodwill the auction generates is even more important than the money.
“We have lots of volunteers who help with the event and hundreds of people from the community who attend,” Hamilton said. “It brings a lot of people together and helps get the Turning Point name out to the community, which is very important.”
The name reached Don Dreher of Cary, who was attending his first Turning Point auction.
“It’s a good event for a good cause,” he said as he nibbled hors d’oeuvres before the start of the live auction. “The organization does a lot of good things for people, and this is a way for me to show support. Besides, I love auctions.”
Items of special interest to Dreher were tickets to a Chicago Bulls game, a Chicago Bears jersey signed by quarterback Erik Kramer and a baseball signed by White Sox slugger Frank Thomas.
Rosemary Blazier of Crystal Lake has attended several of the auctions and looks forward to each one. Like Hamilton, she sees the event’s greatest benefit coming from the publicity and goodwill it generates.
“The thought that so many people work so hard to help others is tremendous,” she said. “We’ve got a wonderful community here.”
