Rose Coombs speaks to the audience after receiving the Service to Seniors Award at the Prairie City Senior Center on Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2023.

PRAIRIE CITY — Longtime Prairie City Senior Center volunteer Rose Coombs was recognized by the Grant County Senior Citizens Advisory Council with its Service to Seniors Award during the center’s weekly lunch on Wednesday, Oct. 4.

As guests waited to dig into a hearty meal of pot roast, mashed potatoes and gravy, council Chair Rick LaMountain noted that Coombs’ dedication to the Prairie City Senior Center was a family affair.

“Rose told me the story of how one day, back in 1976, her parents came to dinner here for the first time,” he said. “By the time they went home that day, her father was the senior center’s president and her mother the secretary/treasurer.”

Since then, he said, Coombs has gone on to devote decades to serving the senior center herself, sitting on the center’s board, pulling a stint as secretary/treasurer and helping to plan and implement substantial renovations to the building.

LaMountain also took note of Coombs’ weekly column on the senior center’s doings in the Blue Mountain Eagle, describing it as “an informative and entertaining missive … that is leavened with wisdom, humor, inspirational Bible passages and the occasional gardening tip.”

Grant County Commissioner Jim Hamsher presented Coombs with a letter of appreciation from the county, and U.S. Rep Cliff Bentz sent an American flag that has flown over the Capitol in Washington, D.C., along with a note of thanks for her volunteer efforts.

Senior center volunteer Tom Roark dedicated his weekly trivia quiz to Coombs and used it to pay tribute to her skills as a musician.

“Rose has been playing hymns at church for 60 years,” he said. “So I figured out how many notes she’s played.”

Assuming she played three hymns a week, Roark said, the total comes out to more than 9,000 songs over six decades.s

“That computes out to 2.7 million notes she has hit,” he added, “and that’s not including practice!”

Coombs thanked the presenters for the awards and the audience for attending, deflecting the credit to others.

“I am just a representative of those who make this place work,” she said.

More than 60 people turned out for the event, filling the senior center to capacity, and Coombs couldn’t resist a sales pitch.

“If all of you who are here today would come back next week,” she said, “we’d really have fun!”

It was the third time the Service to Seniors Award has been presented. Lucie Immoos, founder of the Carrie Young Memorial Dinner and Auction, and longtime Monument Senior Center volunteers Bob and Sylvia Cockrell were honored earlier this year.