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Annual Wilton Lions Club Penny Sale scheduled for Oct. 27

By Jessie Salisbury - For The Telegraph | Oct 15, 2018

WILTON – More than 60 years of family fun, and it keeps getting better.

The annual Lions Club Penny Sale will be on Oct. 27. The doors open at 4:30 p.m., and the sale begins at 6 p.m., in the Florence Rideout Elementary School gym.

Club Secretary Deb Degan said there “are hundreds of prizes. Some donated, some purchased by the Club.”

There will also be a 50/50 raffle, special raffle items, door prizes, and, she said, “a popcorn machine, and a big snack bar with chili and hot dogs.”

The “big raffle” this year is five $100 gift cards to Market Basket,” what Degan called “an excellent prize.” Tickets are 5 for $20, $5 for a single, and only 1000 will be sold. All cards go to the winner.

Most years it is a donated item such as a bicycle.

The format is standard. Prizes are arranged on tables around the gym with a plastic bucket beside each one to collect tickets, from which the winner is drawn.

Tickets are available at Putnam’s Clothing the week of the sale.

The event is “a real family thing,” Degan said, and usually draws about 300 people.

It all began in 1953, long-time member Dick Putnam said. “Bob Stanton was King Lion and they held it in the town hall, where the theater is.”

The event later moved to the school gym.

“The only big change,” Putnam said, “is originally gifts were walked around through the audience by club members. That was a lot of walking. We used to have boxes of groceries from Harwood’s Market, and lots of baskets of apples.”

Selectman Kermit Williams is a frequent official, reading names of winners.

The Lions Club supports many community activities including The Open Cupboard Food Pantry and the Wilton-Lyndeborough Youth Center, as well as providing college scholarships.

“It’s the best and biggest penny sale around,” Putnam said. It is also probably the oldest.

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