The 2009 Lyle Area Cancer Auction committee shows its appreciation tonight.

A week ago, volunteers raised $118,000 for cancer research and now the volunteers want to thank those who made that possible.

Like the fundraising event itself at American Legion Post No. 105 and — let’s not forget — the city maintenance shed next door, there are no frills.

They are calling tonight’s event a “Family Reunion” potluck. The LACA family is huge.

“It’s not just for volunteers; it’s for everyone,” said Teresa Slowinski. “Not just the volunteers, but everybody who was a part of last weekend’s fundraising.”

“We ask that everyone bring a dish to pass. A salad or a hot dish or a dessert,” said Larry Ricke, co-chairman, sounding more like a caterer than hard-working LACA volunteer.

“It’s just a potluck supper really,” Ricke added. “Just a time to get together.”

Nothing is real, it seems, when the annual charity auction is held each mid-January in Lyle … $350 for canned pickles, $4,000 for a semi grain hauler carved in wood, $350 for a 12-pack of beer that is returned each year to be rebid.

“Unbelievable” is a word frequently heard when describing the fundraising frenzy.

“I get that all the time,” said the frenetic Ricke, when asked “Are you on drugs?” at the auction. “I tell them ‘No, I’m not. I’m drug-free. It’s the excitement that keeps me going. It’s unbelievable.’”

This year, Dr. Joshua Lieow, a scientist, and Gail Dennison, director of public relations at The Hormel Institute, spoke to the Saturday afternoon auction crowd about the important work being done at the research center in Austin and how the LACA dollars raised are needed by cancer researchers.

THe Hormel Institute, Mayo Clinic and University of Minnesota share in the Fifth District Eagles Cancer Telethon’s beneficence when the funds raised are distributed.

Who knows? Maybe the monies earned from the sale of a homemade pie, an oil change or at any one of the other events will help fund the research to find a cure for cancer.

Throughout the region, the Fifth District Eagles Cancer Telethon galvanizes people in small towns everywhere into raising money for cancer research.

Volunteers raised $2,215 at LeRoy, $5,045 at Grand Meadow, $19,000 at the Austin Eagles Club and an incredible $72,000 at a Geneva auction held over two weekends.

More monies are donated from hundreds of fundraising events in a three-state area.

Children turn in savings banks and penny jars, making it a very personal fundraiser.

The number of events is impossible to record except in the hearts of the donors.

The Grand Meadow Lions Club raised $4,000 at a pancake breakfast last Sunday morning.

More than 600 people toured the haunted barn in only four hours at the Jeff and Georgia Ramaker farm last October to donate to the LACA bash. The result: $2,200 was donated.

A four-wheeler raffle earned $1,606.

Matt Weber won a new Harley Davidson motorcycle in a raffle drawing that netted LACA $16,000.

A Crop For A Cure scrapbooking event earned $3,500.

The annual Carpenter, Iowa pool tournament earned $30,000.

Maybe, it’s the fact cancer has touched everyone. The lists of cancer victims and survivors, hanging from the walls of the Lyle city garage where the auction took place Jan. 16-17 contain names from northern Iowa and southern Minnesota that everyone recognizes.

What makes it so special a time for those who attend?

Maybe, it’s the empty seats. When someone misses an auction, it doesn’t go unnoticed, hence the “family” feel to the party-style bash with such serious underpinnings.

The death of Myrna Bissen, Stacyville, Iowa was mourned at the 2009 auction.

“The Bissen family usually fills up a couple of rows of people at the auction ane they’re very generous,” Ricke said.

With four sons and seven daughters, 34 grandchildren and 28-great-grandchildren, it’s easy to understand how Fred and Mryna Bissen’s family was prominent at past annual auctions and missed at the 2009 event.

The patriarch of the Bissen family presented LACA volunteers with a check for this year’s fundraiser at his wife’s funeral wake last Friday.

Go ahead. Say it aloud: unbelievable.

Cancer’s impact to the young and the old, as well as everyone in between, makes it so personal for everyone involved.

For instance, Tracy Schilling, who organizes the annual Halfway To Cancer Bash each June.

When she turned in a check for $2,600 Saturday night, it stopped the auction in its tracks: Schilling is herself a cancer survivor for the last five years.

There are other examples.

This year, Gary Harrison, an auction volunteer for all 30 years of its existence, returned with an eagle carved by Chuck Berg, which earned $625.

Harrison was the first to buy Berg’s eagle in 2004. The next year he returned the eagle to be rebid and started a LACA tradition.

The presentation of the eagle is done to the strains of Lee Greenwood’s “Proud to be an American.”

Everybody is on their feet, caps doffed and hands over hearts.

To date, the wood-carved eagle has raised $4,000.

“I get choked up every time they auction it,” said Harrison, a retired Mower County jailer and peace officer. “I hope to be around to purchase that eagle back and hang it in my house.”

“Unbelievable” describes the auction bidders’ fascination with Harrison’s eagle.

“Right away the next year after I first brought it, a man from St. Ansgar, Iowa, bought it for 500-and-some dollars and right away that same night in 2005, he turned around and donated it back to the auction and ended up buying it a second time.”

Still another example helps explain it.

Fresh from spending $4,000 for a Chuck Berg wood carving, Ivan and Mary Witt were marveling over the LACA success stories being retold

Three years ago, the Witts purchased another item from the Berg wood carving collection. Now, they won’t part with it.

“Mary was gracious enough to make a glass cover to put over it and now it’s on display in our home,” Ivan said.

The Witts, like others at the auction, observe a certain protocol that sets the LACA auction apart.

“Before that,” Ivan said, “we would bid on whatever Chuck brought to the auction, but Chuck’s family always bid the most and got them. We would always back out of it , so a son or grandson could get them and keep them in the Berg family.”

Now, the Witts have another Berg item to keep for themselves.

So tonight it’s a family reunion potluck for everybody and bring a dish to pass.

Tonight more stories about the 2009 LACA fundraising bash will be shared and the co-chairpersons’ thanks to all at the appreciation supper.

“I’m afraid to start mentioning all the people we have to thank, because I’m afraid we will miss someone,” said Ricke. “The Legion, the city, the auctioneers, the bidders, the businesses who donated items for the auction, the volunteers. Everybody.

“Did I tell you they raised $3,500 in the Legion kitchen from food sales? We’ve got to thank the food vendors, too,” he quickly added.

The 2009 LACA appreciation supper begins at 5 p.m. with a social hour. The potluck-style supper will be served at 6 p.m. with a brief program afterward.

Anyone who helped raise the $118,000 collected for cancer research is invited to attend.

That’s a six-figure sum six years in a row.

Take that, cancer.