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Red Hat Society attracts attention, fun and friendship

Red Hat Society attracts attention, fun and friendship

By MARTY MORRISON

Date published: 4/6/2003

HEADS TURN.

Eyes pop.

Jaws drop.

The poshly appareled women attract attention wherever they go.

Maybe it's their passionate purple outfits.

Or their flaming red hats festooned with feathers and bows.

Or their confident high-heeled stride as they strut down the sidewalk.

These ladies have earned the right to be outrageous.

Age has everything to do with it.

"We can do anything we damned well please," Diane Snead tells friends gathered downtown for shopping and dinner at Claiborne's restaurant.

Such is the mantra of the Red Hat Society. Females fifty-something and beyond are flocking to this senior sisterhood like celebrity wannabes to an American Idol competition.

The society has 8,000 chapters nationally and in 12 foreign countries. Between 150,000 to 200,000 consider themselves Red Hatters.

They are wives, mothers and grandmothers who've carpooled their children, carted them to college and wept at their weddings. They've toasted anniversaries, divorced or buried one or more husbands.

They've organized meals at home and meetings at work. They are teachers, supervisors and secretaries. Some have retired, others still dream of it.

But they're not about to rock away their golden years on the front porch. They're flaunting fun and thumbing their noses at anyone who stands in their way.

The more outlandish the better.

On a recent springlike afternoon, this procession of eight strolls down sidewalks and slips in shops that pique their curiosity.

Snead is the youngest of the group at 51, impeccably dressed in a cardinal-color blazer that clashes with her royal purple knit dress. A red-feathered boa bands her wide-brimmed hat and streams down her back.

"People at work couldn't believe I was going out looking like this," Snead says.

"Oh, they must be young," Nancy Ballenger scoffs.

She is an older member at 69, dressed in purple except for her red cloche embellished with a shimmery band and fluffy ostrich tuft.

She spies a red-striped sequined purse in the Pavilion gift shop and flashes it for Barbara Walor to see.

"You have to get this," Ballenger insists. "It will be perfect for the convention."

Walor studies the boxy handbag then frowns at the $69 price tag.

"Oh, all right," she says, scooping it up along with a "Queen of the Court" nightshirt then heading for the sales desk.

Date published: 4/6/2003