The Rotary’s Soup Bowl Supper kicked off April 3 at the American Legion Hall for the 18th consecutive year.

For the nearly 200 people that packed the house, it was not about the door prizes, the raffle, or even the dessert table (although the cakes looked mighty tempting). It was about a community coming together.

Sure, the Soup Bowl Supper is a great fundraiser for the Rotary Club and Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts, but as Rotarian Jim Botti pointed out, the supper is not a huge money-making event, but rather a longstanding tradition where friends and families can enjoy each other’s company. 

“It’s great just to see all these people come together and do this,” Botti said. “In a small town like Boothbay, I guess it’s possible that everybody seems to know everybody. It’s just a good mingling.”

Families and friends from as close as the neighboring town of Newcastle, and as far as Middletown, N.Y., attended the dinner where everyone gets select a ceramic bowl to keep from the Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts.  For this event, Watershed collaborated with a wide range of people, from students at Lincoln Academy to artists well into their retirement age, said Director Fran Rudolf. 

“We’re all about providing a space for artists. Whether young or old, to experiment or explore artistic ideas with clay.” 

And judging by the empty table, the ceramic bowls have become quite popular over the years. For Helen and Hamilton Meserve, this year marked their seventh Soup Bowl Supper. 

“Now that I have a whole cabinet of ceramic bowls, we can finally host a full dinner party,” Helen Meserve said. 

The food line featured hungry diners scooping out the more than 25 savory soups. By the end of the night everything (including the decorative table bouquets) were raffled off, and the leftover soup was to be donated to local food pantries.