“You have to do something besides just be yourself. You have to help people.”

Those words rang in Ann Bittner’s ears as her 5-year-old daughter recovered from spinal meningitis. “To thank God for my daughter’s return, I wanted to do something to help others,” Ann said. The year was 1955, and Ann was about to begin five decades of thanking God and helping others here in Westbrook.

Ann was born in 1924 in New York. In the early 1950s, Ann moved to Westbrook with her husband, Burton; first to Laurette Porell’s house on Saco Street, and then to the house she and Burton purchased at 286 Saco St. There they raised their son, Matthew, and daughter, Holly, both of whom graduated from Westbrook High School. Matthew and his wife, Julia, now live in Yarmouth. Holly and her husband, Gary Bricker, now live in Auburn. Ann now lives at the Heights at Liza Harmon Drive. Burton passed away three years ago.

Burton worked as an engineer at S.D. Warren from 1950 to 1998, and also served as the part-time chief of police for Westbrook from 1957-58. Ann worked at home raising Matthew and Holly. Then, in 1955, shortly after they moved to Westbrook, Holly came down with spinal meningitis. As Ann prayed for Holly’s recovery, she remembered her mother’s words.

“I was always told growing up that God put me on earth to be a helper,” Ann remembered. So Ann began helping distribute food at the Westbrook Food Pantry. Back in 1955, the pantry distributed government food like cheese and canned goods once a month from the bowling alley underneath the old city hall on Main Street, near where the Men’s Shop used to be. At Thanksgiving, the pantry would distribute special baskets of food.

Fifty years later, Ann still works with the food pantry. Ann has seen the pantry change and respond to an ever-growing need for food. Now the food pantry distributes a wide variety of food, including fresh fruit and vegetables, once a week, and still provides special Thanksgiving baskets.

“We help so many people now. Each year, you get more people. It’s more of a basic now,” said Ann, who works each Tuesday evening.

Ann has also run the Good Samaritan Fund since the 1980s. The fund provides food and fuel assistance to people referred by the city of Westbrook, relying upon money donated by Westbrook churches and other organizations.

Ann and Burton used to deliver Meals on Wheels together, beginning in the late 1960s or early 1970s. Also since the 1970s, Ann has done the Christmas shopping for the families the Kiwanis sponsor. Before, Ann would buy the clothes for the children. The Kiwanis would then wrap the clothes and deliver them to the families. Now, Ann shops with the parents from the eight to 12 families the Kiwanis sponsor a year. The parents then wrap the clothes and give them to their children for Christmas.

Helping families in need has been “marvelous,” Ann said. “People appreciate it a little more now than they did years ago. But I don’t ask for appreciation. You do it from the heart. I remember a mother wrote a letter to me, thanking me, and saying once in a lifetime you meet someone who is really there for you.”

Ann used to lector at St. Mary’s Church and now helps with the bean suppers at Westbrook-Warren Congregational Church. She has also volunteered at Springbrook Nursing Home since it opened, doing “a little bit of everything. Whatever they need. Shopping for a resident. Sitting with them one on one. Whatever was necessary, I’d pitch in.”

Ann acknowledged that “many people don’t volunteer at nursing homes because they think it’s sad. It isn’t sad. Once you talk to these people and see the smile on their faces, it’s not sad.”

Ann also helps “my seniors” by organizing monthly day trips and two big trips a year for senior citizens in and around Westbrook. Building upon experience she gained helping an old friend, Jacky Herbert, run her travel agency in South Portland, Ann has organized trips for senior citizens since the 1980s. She arranges the travel, food, hotels, activities, everything. In April, her senior citizens group will take a day trip to Lincoln, New Hampshire to see some Canadian performers. Other upcoming day trips include a clam bake on Cabbage Island off Boothbay in July, taking a mystery train ride to see the fall foliage in October, and seeing the Von Trapp children (of “Sound of Music” fame) in November. In May, her group will travel to Tennessee for six days. In November, they will cruise down the Danube River through Holland, Germany and Austria for 16 days. Organizing the trips for the one to two bus loads of seniors who usually travel with her is a lot of work, but “I enjoy my seniors,” Ann explained. “Life is worth living. I’m not just sitting around.”

Ann has no plans to start sitting around. Staying active and helping others means “the day is not so long. I have something to do.” One of the reasons Ann enjoys helping others, whether it is at the food pantry, at Springbrook, or in organizing her trips, is it gives her the opportunity to meet people.

“When we moved to Westbrook, we didn’t know many people. (Volunteering) helped me feel part of the town,” she said. “I get enjoyment and love from what I do. I meet people. Life is wonderful when you meet people.”