A Legacy Big Enough For All Spokane To Share

Six years ago, my husband agreed to coach a gaggle of 5-year-old soccer players. While on the phone with a relative, he mentioned his new volunteer job.

“Why would you want to do that? You don’t have kids on the team,” he was asked.

My husband explained that he worked with the league coordinator, knew they were short of coaches, and, having played the sport all his life, decided to help out.

“I wouldn’t do too much of that,” the relative advised. “When people find out you’re the helpful sort, they never leave you alone.”

The remark came to mind recently when I received word that Rick Scammell had died at the age of 47.

Rick was an executive at Washington Trust Bank, and responsible for their charitable donations. He also was a mentor for the Children’s Museum of Spokane, where I am vice president.

In the few months I knew him, I was struck by the far reach of his helping hand. From the Spokane Symphony and Cheney Cowles Museum to the Community Mental Health Center, Boy Scouts and the YMCA; from the Transitional School to the Art School, Rick helped groups thrive.

I suspect he was the sort of person people never left alone.

Last summer, the Children’s Museum approached Rick at the bank with our idea for a Greek Village for children to explore, to complement Cheney Cowles’ Treasures of the Antiquities exhibit.

At the time, we had much community-outreach experience under our belts but no experience building and presenting an exhibit. The board president and I spent hours in my kitchen fine-tuning the four-paragraph proposal before taking our grant application to him.

We were nervous about making the request. Would he laugh us out of the room?

Rick’s response was not laughter but enthusiasm. “Spokane needs you guys,” he said. He gave us the check we requested, and then something we never expected - his time.

He personally took our grant application to other businesses and asked them for matching donations. He routinely gave us his lunch hour to provide advice and counsel. He gave us his reputation, telling us whom to call for a variety of needs.

He gave us confidence.

“You’re young, energetic parents building something because the community needs it. That’s exciting,” he reassured us.

Many of my peers would not dream of committing the kind of time Rick Scammell gave to civic pursuits.

A great many of the Christmas cards my husband and I received this year from former co-workers contained news about how their jobs were going, barely noting that their lives consisted of anything else. I spent several years putting in 12-hour days, only to come home, eat dinner, then log onto the office server for a few more hours.

My husband used to work in an environment where all-nighters were near ritual. He confesses that coaching the soccer team was primarily an excuse not to go into the office Saturday mornings.

At the end of a day like this, what has truly been accomplished? A sleeker presentation or a thicker pile of research? A week later, does anyone remember that we knocked ourselves out the week before?

If life throws the sort of curve it often does, the sort it threw Rick Scammell, what will people remember about us, other than our devotion to a career?

The Children’s Museum of Spokane was not the first young organization to which Rick lent his expertise. We are mourning his loss and wish that we had told him what his support meant to us. He helped us find our legs, and because of the time he spent with us, we believe we are ready to walk.

On the day Rick’s obituary appeared, the same page listed names of 18 babies born the previous day in area hospitals - 18 children who will hear a trumpet for the first time at a Spokane Symphony children’s concert, pick up a paint brush at the Art School or spend an afternoon exploring their world at the Children’s Museum.

They will feel the impact of one person’s life long after he is gone.

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The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Mary Douthitt Contributing writer