The Granbury Bridge Club raises over $19k for Alzheimer’s Association

With a total across teams of over $1 million raised, the Granbury Bridge Club alone raised over $19,000 for the Alzheimer’s Association’s yearly fundraiser “The Longest Day.” The Longest Day event takes place on the longest day of the year, summer solstice, the day of the year with the most sunlight.

The Granbury Bridge Club is part of the American Contract Bridge League (ACBL) which hosted the sanctioned games across the country to support the event. The Granbury Bridge Club ranked in the top fifteen of teams in money raised among all teams across the nation.

Founded in 1937 the ACBL is the largest bridge organization in the world serving 135,000 members and 3,000 bridge clubs. The ACBL holds three North American Bridge Championships, each attracting up to 6,500 players from all around the world.

Bridge is a recommended activity to reduce the risk of cognitive decline. A game well-known for its critical thinking skills, the game of bridge also encourages social gathering. Due to the game’s social-gathering aspects and mentally-engaging challenges the Alzheimer’s Association recommends bridge among “10 Ways to Love Your Brain” for people to reduce their risk of cognitive decline.

The ACBL began partnering with the Alzheimer’s Association for “The Longest Day” in 2013, and since then bridge players for ACBL have raised over $9.3 million toward the cause.

Gwen Faherty with the Granbury Bridge Club shared, “The Alzheimer’s Association’s ‘Longest Day’ fundraiser is so important to the cure and awareness of this horrific disease. We were so humbled and grateful to this wonderful community and bridge players for contributing so generously to this cause.”

Carmond “Fitz” Fitzgerald, echoed the sentiment, saying “I never cease to be amazed at how generous Granbury folks are with contributions to this worthy cause. I am also appreciative of Hood County News’ support in advertising the campaign over the past eight years.” Fitzgerald is the Granbury Bridge Club director and was the team captain for fundraising for the event.

The top fundraising groups of ACBL’s global team were:

1. Bridge Club of Atlanta - Atlanta, Georgia - $171,385 raised
2. BRIDGExpress - Great Neck, New York - $116,506 raised
3. St. Louis Bridge Center - St. Louis, Missouri - $55,617 raised
4. Indianapolis Bridge Center - Indianapolis, Indiana - $43,338 raised
5. Santa Barbara Bridge Center - Santa Barbara, California - $40,034 raised
6. Unit 498 & The Peninsula Team - Belmont, California - $33,732 raised
7. Bridge Heroes 2023 - Arlington, Virginia - $32,586 raised
8. Charlotte Bridge Association - Charlotte, North Carolina - $30,297 raised
9. Fort Wayne Duplicate Bridge Club - Fort Wayne, Indiana - $23,460 raised
10. Evansville Duplicate Bridge Club - Newburgh, Indiana - $22,032 raised
11. Granbury Bridge Club - Granbury, Texas - $19,200 raised
12. San Diego Unit 539 - San Diego, California - $17,450 raised
13. Duke City Bridge Club - Albuquerque, New Mexico - $16,737
14. ACBL Unit 206 - Hixson, Tennessee - $15,551
15. Newtown Bridge Club - Sandy Hook, Connecticut - $15,395

Additionally, ACBL donated all sanction fees collected from these games to the global team.

“Many of our lives have been touched by Alzheimer’s and dementia, and the ACBL community has rallied to support the research for its prevention and treatment by participating in an activity they love,” said Bronia Jenkins, ASBL’s executive director, “I am amazed by the generosity of our membership and the hard work they put into ‘The Longest Day’ to support the Alzheimer’s Association.”

For information on ACBL visit acbl.org. For information on the Granbury Bridge Club email gwendolynleigh@att.net