Mike's St. Baldrick's 2005 Photo Gallery

Mike's 2nd Time in the Chair

On Saturday, March 12th, I joined eleven other brave "shavees" at the Old Brogue Irish Pub in Great Falls, VA for the St. Baldrick's 2005 charity head shave event. St. Baldrick's is a whimsical twist on St. Patrick's Day - when brave volunteers agreed to shave their heads bald to raise funds for childhood cancer research. Funds raised at the events go to benefit CureSearch National Childhood Cancer Foundation - which supports CureSearch Children's Oncology Group - the world's foremost childhood cancer research organization.

I hope that you will take a few minutes and look around the St. Baldrick's website (http://www.stbaldricks.org/).

Kathleen Goldsmith, organizer of the St Baldrick's event at the Old Brogue, gave here greetings before the shaving began.

Kathleen Goldsmith introduced Mike Kearney, owner of the Old Brogue Irish Pub. Mike has been generous enough to host the event each year.

After introducint Mike Kearney, Kathleen Goldsmith presented him with a plaque from St. Baldrick's to thank him for hosting the event.

Kathleen introduced her husband Bill Goldsmith who introduced the shavees, barbers, and kept the audience entertained during the shaving. Bill started by making a toast.

I was in the first group of four shavees. I got a few photos from the chair with my small pocket camera. First is a quick picture before loosing any hair. Sean Meyers was in the chair on my right. He shaved both his head and beard.

The Old Brogue was filled with people both young and old supporting St. Baldrick's.

After I was done being shaved bald, I got out of the chair and switched to my new Canon Digital Rebel camera. I was able to capture the head shaving from the audience.

Sean Meyers was just one of two guys with really long hair. The other was Scott Retter, he had long dreadlocks. It didn't take the barbers too long to cut off the dreadlocks.

There is a clown in every group. This year, it was Dr. Michael McCombs. He is an orthodontis and he brought a pair of flashing red teeth.

The barber had some fun blowing on Jeff Crowe's bald spot.

There were two women, Patricia Rutter and Sheri Berman who were brave enough to have their heads shaved. Patricia Rutter came prepared with green hair.

One of the best parts of the event was watching the reaction of the shavees and their families.

A green, St. Baldrick's hat was passed around the crowd to collect additional money.

We were fortunate to have Jim Board there taking event photos again.

After the last shavee was done, we headed outside for some group photos. It was a nice March evening.

It was a great evening. As a group, we raised more than $26,000 for St Baldricks.

After I got home, I took my official "after" photo.