FlyingSamaritans

Los Amigos Chapter

HISTORY OF THE FLYING SAMARITANS

   (click here ) for Portrait of Mama Espinoza, co-founder of the Flying Samaritans.

Please visit the Flying Samaritans International web site to read the complete story of how the Flying Samaritan's came into existence.

How the Los Amigos Chapter Began.....

In 1989 seven Flying Samaritans from the Phoenix area were traveling each month to Tucson to attend meetings and leave on trips to Baja. Tucson had the only Arizona Chapter of the Flying Samaritans. By mid 1989 this was getting old, so Marilyn Berton and others started the process of forming a Phoenix Chapter. Their first task was to find a clinic location. Clinic searches were made by landing at small Mexican towns and meeting with the local officials. After several trips they decided on a clinic site. Miguel Aleman was suggested by the Mexican Health Services organization. Miguel Aleman is located on the mainland of Mexico about 40 miles west of Hermosillo. The town consisted of mostly migrant farm workers and was in great need because, being migrants with no local employer paying their wages, they were not entitled to use the local Mexican clinic facility. The first Phoenix sponsored clinic was in January 1990.

In October 1990 a donation of $1500 from American Express gave the Phoenix group the financial boost they needed to get started with mail, equipment and so forth. In January 1991 Phoenix became an "official" chapter and selected the name Los Amigos, which was felt truly represented the Chapter's warmest feelings.

In June 1992 the Los Amigos Chapter was advised that they could no longer hold clinics at Miguel Aleman. Although it is not known for sure, it is suspected that on mainland Mexico there were some conflicting political issues.

For the next several months Los Amigos continued to serve the populations in Mexico on a temporary clinic basis at various locations, including Mulege` in Baja Sur. The Chapter was floundering without a permanent location for a clinic. Marilyn worked to hold the group together with events, newsletters and an occasional Mulege` clinic. When a general membership meeting was held in September 1993 and only 4 people showed up, Marilyn suggested that the Los Amigos Chapter be closed. But, when no one supported that idea, it was decided to take no action at that time.

Later that same night Marilyn received a telephone call from Dr. Don Bucklin saying he was a doctor and a pilot with an airplane and wanted to get involved with the Flying Samaritans. That was the sign they were waiting for. Marilyn called  Bill DeLaVara and they rejoiced. In October, 1993, sixteen months after the clinic in Miguel Aleman was closed, the first clinic in San Juanico was held. The official letter of invitation arrived from the Mexican Rotary in November 1993.

Dr. Don Bucklin

In February 1994, while on a whale-watching trip to Lopez Mateos, the Rotary and the community leader of Lopez Mateos asked the Los Amigos Chapter to serve their town. They hosted a tour of their clinic and provided a fish fry luncheon complete with turtle soup. The town suffered an 80% unemployment rate because the cannery had reduced employees from 1200 to 100. In September, 1994 the Los Amigos Chapter held their first clinic in Lopez Mateos. In 1995 the Flying Samaritans expanded their clinic to the community of Las Barrancas.

Since 1990 membership in the Los Amigos Chapter has grown from 7 to over 400 volunteers.   Golf tournaments, original dinner theater productions, raffles as well as corporate and personal donations have helped raise the necessary funds to refurbish and build a permanent clinic building on land donated by the cannery.  Over the past few years, donations have made it possible to add additional dental units, dental equipment, a chiropractic facility, medical equipment,  a pharmacy  and  supplies needed to make the clinics run  efficiently.  

The Phoenix based Chapter travels to Baja ten months out of the year providing general medical, dental, optometry and chiropractic care for up to 350 patients each month. Occasionally patients with serious ailments that cannot be treated locally have been transported to the U.S. or elsewhere in Mexico for specialized care.