NORWICH – More than 120 people gathered at the Park Place Restaurant and Lounge Saturday for the 9th annual St. Baldrick’s Head-Shaving Event and fundraiser for childhood cancer.

At the beginning of Saturday’s event, more than $13,500 in donations had already been raised by participants; by the end the night, an additional $5,175 had been amassed, bringing the total amount raised to approximately $18,750.

Proceeds from the event will be donated to nearby hospitals which treat childhood cancer, such as Golisano Children's Hospital, a part of the SUNY Upstate Medical University in Syracuse. Subsequently, the hospitals which will be receiving the donations raised Saturday are the same hospitals most likely to treat children from Chenango County who are suffering from cancer.

“We are right in the neighborhood of what we raised last year and the event is still open to donations,” said lead organizer A. Jones, who took the reins this year from longtime organizer Tracy Chawgo. Although this is Jones first time acting as lead organizer, he has been involved in the annual event since its inception and has himself been a shavee four times. “It went really well and everyone had a good time,” he added, summing up Saturday’s event.

The event sported a number of silent and Chinese auctions along with 50/50 raffles, but the main attraction were the head shavings. Thirty-two people, eight of whom were women, voluntarily went bald Saturday to raise money ‘on their heads’ to help fund research on childhood cancers. The participants sat two at a time in front of a large crowd, which filled Park Place’s main dinning hall to capacity. To the cheers of encouragement from those gathered, the 32 participants proceeded to have their heads shaved in order, beginning with those who were able to raise the most amount of money.