However the Wyndham Pioneer Lions Club member walked away from last month’s club meeting with not one but two awards under her arm.
Mrs Henry, who now lives in Mokoreta, near the Catlins, after a career in teaching at schools in Southland and the Catlins, joined the club in 2017 and became the club’s secretary in 2018.
She was involved in administration and meetings and had bolstered club presidents and committees.
Last month she was presented with the Melvin Jones Fellowship, one of the top accolades of the Lions Club International Foundation, and the PDG Ross Cockburn Quiet Achiever Award, which recognises those who steer the ship behind the scenes.
Mrs Henry said she was never focused on the silverware.
‘‘I was totally overwhelmed, because I really have always felt that I ... just go along and do as much as I can, without expecting anything back.
You don't go along expecting to be rewarded for anything, you go along to help others,” Mrs Henry said.
She said one of many highlights of her time with the Lions Club was providing a defibrillator for a teenager with a heart condition.
“If everybody in the community does something to help someone else in the community, surely, as a society, we're all better off,” she said.
She spent her early childhood in Central Otago, and lived in Dunedin “for a fair chunk of my life”, she said.
She made the move further south to pursue teaching in the 1970s.
Mrs Henry became the principal of Tuturau School in the 1990s after teaching at Tokanui School, in the Catlins, and Mataura Island, in Southland.
