Hundreds of people enjoyed pancakes and sausage for breakfast, lunch or dinner Tuesday at the Temple Theater ballroom, welcoming a huge helping of community and support for local youth activities.

The 71st annual Pancake Jubilee displayed stack after stack of flapjacks, huge boxes of  sausage, and pitchers of syrup waiting on tables for hungry supporters of the Downtown Optimist Club. 

The event brought out seasoned veterans of the club to Meridian’s own annual pancake-palooza. The event helps raise most of the $18,000 to $20,000 the organization uses to support activities for local children. 

For anyone interested in breakfast food, the longtime local event satisfied cravings. For people interested in helping the community a few bites at a time, they also left with satisfaction.

Paul Tarver, the secretary for the Downtown Optimist Club, has taken part in the fundraiser for a quarter century and said he looks forward to many more. He had a special location where he used an industrial-sized mixer to stir pancake batter in a 44-gallon container.

“We do it for the youth,” Tarver said. “But community service is the foundation for building community, and that is what it is all about for me.”

A cross-section of locals came together for the gathering. Funds raised from the day will support activities ranging from helping kids faced with domestic abuse situations to the Salvation Army Angel Tree to Shop with a Cop.

Many representatives from agenies that receive support from the fundraiser volunteered their time to help bus tables and collect tickets for the event. Sara Smith and Katy Bardell, with Care Lodge, a local domestic violence shelter, took a break from volunteering to energize with the help of pancakes, syrup, sausage and chocolate milk.

“They support us, and we’re supporting them back,” Smith said.

Gary Tuberville, founder of Cans for Kids Children’s Ministry, said support from the Optimist Club helped his group provide Christmas gifts and support for 297 children and food for their families.

“They do a wonderful job,” said Tuberville, who volunteered at the event.

In recent decades, civic groups throughout the nation have struggled to retain dwindling membership and continue to function. Within the most recent year, the local chapter of Kiwanis went inactive.

Local attorney Lee Thaggard, president of the Downton Optimist Club, said he welcomes the work associated with the fundraiser and the club’s weekly meetings at Western Sizzlin steak house.

“This is not a stress on my life,” he said, taking a break from his pancake duty. “I enjoy all of this.”