ROCKINGHAM – Two longtime residents of Richmond County are the latest additions to the Board of Trustees of the FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital Foundation.
A Richmond County native, Shirley Fuller is a retired public school administrator. Susan Wood, a native of Anson County, has lived in Richmond County for 30 years and has been a legal assistant with a Rockingham law firm since 1988.
The two recently joined the 18-member board that is chaired by Ken Goodman.
“Members of the Board of Trustees of the FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital Foundation are happy to welcome Mrs. Fuller and Mrs. Wood to our group,” Goodman says. “Each of them brings a unique perspective to the Board that I am sure will enrich our service to our community’s hospital. At the same time, we thank retiring Board members Ruth Watkins and J.C. Watkins for their years of service. We are enormously grateful for their insight and wisdom.”
Richmond Memorial Hospital Foundation Board members are eligible to serve two three-year terms. In addition to Fuller, Wood and Goodman, current Board members are Lynn McCaskill, Sabrina McDonald (secretary), Roger Staley (treasurer and immediate past chair), Dr. Andrew Doolittle, Dr. John Flannery, Pattie Jenkins, Dr. Larry Weatherly, Jeff Hamilton, John Hutchinson, Paul Smart, Bruce Stanback and Ed Taylor (vice chair).
Ex officio members are John Jackson, president of Richmond Memorial Hospital; Kathleen Stockham, president of the Foundation of FirstHealth; and Russell Bennett.
Shirley Fuller earned a bachelor’s degree in education from Winston-Salem State University and a master’s degree in elementary education and school administration from North Carolina A&T University. She began her career in education as an elementary school teacher and later served as principal of Hoffman School and West Rockingham School before retiring last year as principal of Rockingham Middle School.
A widow with one daughter, Shannah Stephens of Charlotte, Fuller also serves on the Board of Directors of the Richmond County Department of Social Services and as a Richmond Community College trustee. She is also a former member of the Rockingham City Council.
“I feel that it’s an honor and a privilege to have been selected to serve on the FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital Foundation Board,” Fuller says. “I look forward to learning all that is entailed and to doing my very best.”
Susan Wood attended Stratford College in Danville, Va., before transferring to Converse College in Spartanburg, S.C., where she majored in sociology and psychology with the intention of becoming a child therapist. After volunteering with several political campaigns, however, she decided to take another career direction and joined the Raleigh law firm of Maupin Taylor & Ellis as a paralegal.
She later accepted a position with her father’s Hamlet-headquartered bottling company business and commuted from Raleigh for a time. She eventually moved to Rockingham, where she met her husband, David Wood, owner of Classic Apparel.
Wood is a member of First Presbyterian Church, where she serves as an elder.
Currently a legal assistant with the Rockingham law firm of Sharpe & Buckner, Wood says her interest in Richmond Memorial Hospital has been influenced by her stepfather, Russell Bennett, and her husband. Bennett is a former member and chair of the hospital’s Board of Trustees and a current member of the Foundation of FirstHealth Board of Trustees and the Richmond Memorial Hospital Foundation Board of Trustees. David Wood serves on Richmond Memorial Hospital’s Finance/Facilities Committee.
“I think the world of FirstHealth of the Carolinas,” Wood says. “I can’t say enough about what a great organization I think it is. I’m very excited about being named to the Foundation’s Board of Trustees, and I look forward to becoming involved in its work.”
The FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital Foundation supports the health care needs of the residents of Richmond County through the Richmond CARE Fund, which helps people with transportation, medications and other needs as they transition home.
The Foundation also supports many of the hospital’s capital improvements – including recent renovations to the Intensive Care Unit and Emergency Department – as well as educational and wellness programs.
FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital is a division of FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital.
