Although North Fork Bank Executive Vice President Carolyn Drexel has chaired and co-chaired events for a number of organizations supported by the Bank’s Foundation, including events for Suffolk County Special Olympics, Long Island Pine Barrens, Long Island Alliance for Lupus, Bronx Lebanon Hospital, Suffolk AHRC, Brookhaven Hospital and the Sid Jacobson JCC, her chairmanship of the upcoming Family Counseling Service’s annual Summer Gala will have special meaning.

The Summer Gala, to be held on the Great Lawn in Westhampton Beach on July 9, will honor North Fork Bank’s Chairman, President and CEO John Kanas and his wife Elaine with the 2005 Family of Man Humanitarian Award.

Drexel notes that Kanas and his wife, a former banker and educator and vice chairman of Family Counseling Service’s Board of Directors, contribute to the nonprofit organization through their family foundation. The Kanases also endow the Raynor Country Day School, Middle Island Caring for Kids, and they have been supportive of groups benefiting the youth on the East End.

“John provides himself as an honoree for many different organizations’ events,” notes Drexel. “He helps children’s organizations and health organizations across the board. If he feels it’s a worthy cause, he gets involved.” He also uses his professional leadership to encourage philanthropy among his peers.

Family Counseling Service provides professional mental health counseling, treatment, education and supportive services to individuals and families from its locations in Westhampton Beach and Shirley. It offers help for emotional and developmental disorders, alcohol and substance abuse, domestic violence and child abuse, and youth and family therapy.

“It’s been exciting to work with the Gala committee on decorations and tenting and getting the invitations out,” says Drexel, who hopes that guests may opt to dress in sync with this year’s “Fabulous Fifties” theme. Family Counseling’s Gala will include a silent auction, several large raffles, and special guests.

Just as Kanas notes in his “Message from the CEO” on the North Fork Bank website that “The power of size will surely add momentum to our company,” the power of participation at this popular Westhampton dinner-dance will benefit the services and programs provided by Family Counseling Service.

Kanas demonstrates his humor, too, in his CEO’s Message. He states, “We are presently reviewing our long-range plans and it would seem, at this writing, that further expansion will be curtailed” – words he penned in a shareholders' message thirty years ago. “So much for my predictive abilities,” quips the chairman.

In fact, today, 55 years after the founding of North Fork Bank & Trust Company through the consolidation of Mattituck Bank and First National Bank of Cutchogue, Carolyn Drexel oversees 5,500 employees and more than 350 branches located all over New York and New Jersey as head of the Retail Division. Her banking career is just shy of 26 years with North Fork, a somewhat unexpected profession for a woman who started out as a substitute teacher.

But then Drexel’s life has been full of twists and turns. Born in Manchester, New Hampshire, into a career Naval Officer’s family, she called many locations home, from Washington D.C. to Norfolk, Virginia, to San Diego, California, and even London, England. After high school in San Diego, Drexel moved on to earn an associate’s degree in liberal arts from Wesley College in Dover, Delaware, and a bachelor’s degree in education from Furman University in South Carolina.

“Looking back,” says Drexel recently in an interview with Networking Magazine, “moving from place to place in my early years taught me to be flexible, to adjust to new environments and people, and gave me an ability to meet and communicate with people. Those types of experiences teach you about the world and about life.”

After a flirtation with the education profession, Drexel paused to start a family. In time, she was anxious to get back to work, and took a teller’s job at Bridgehampton National Bank, where she worked for five years. In 1979, she joined North Fork Bank in its management training program.

“After three months,” says Drexel, “Mr. Kanas said, ‘You’re ready,’ and I was appointed assistant manager of the Speonk branch.”

Drexel’s career advanced to branch manager and then Regional Administrator in charge of the South Fork branches. In 1993, she was appointed Senior Vice President of the Branch Network. At the time, she recalls, the bank may have had 35 to 40 branches. By 1997, Drexel took on the responsibility of managing the entire Retail Division, and was appointed Executive Vice President.

Management of the 350-plus branch network includes the teller system, corporate sales, marketing and branding, and the cash management department, assisting businesses with services to manage their companies from collection of payments to online banking. Drexel characterizes her tasks as handling “all customer services, other than lending.”

Throughout her careers as banking professional and “mom,” Drexel has been active in civic and community groups. She is proud to have been one of the first women to be invited to join Rotary International.

“That was back in the 1980s,” notes Drexel, “when Rotary was all men.” She recalls that a challenge to the all-male service organization was initiated in California, in large part because “women were becoming more involved in business and having their own businesses.”

“I was working in the Speonk office and knew businessmen who were going to Rotary,” explains Drexel, “and I was invited to join through the Westhampton Rotary Club.” She was the eighth woman in the United States to become a Rotarian.

Drexel is also an avid supporter of the Salvation Army and was honored at the organization’s 35th annual Golf Outing in 1996. Two nonprofit organizations that receive special interest from Drexel are Safe Horizons and Friends of Karen. She serves on the Board of Directors of Horizons and the Executive Board of Friends.

Safe Horizons is a leading nonprofit victim assistance, advocacy and violence protection organization with more than 80 programs throughout New York City’s five boroughs. It provides support, prevents violence and promotes justice for victims of crime and abuse, their families and communities.

“Through bank partnering in Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island, Safe Horizons helps provide shelter for children and women victims of crime and has established child advocacy groups,” says Drexel. One initiative, she adds, has been the opening of shelters that are close to police stations. The shelters offer child-friendly environments, including “little seats, crayons and puzzles.” They also provide doctors, psychologists and private examination rooms. She notes that Safe Horizons stepped forward during the September 11 tragedy to assist “those victims of crime.”

The Westhampton nonprofit organization, Friends of Karen, was named for a young girl who was terminally ill. Drexel’s work on the nonprofit’s board includes fundraising efforts to provide financial support to parents and families in similar situations.

Drexel has been honored by the Epilepsy Foundation of Long Island with its “Distinguished Long Islander” Award in 1998, the 23rd Street Association’s Distinguished Citizen Award and the Urban Resource Institute’s Leadership Award in 2002.

In addition to her busy professional career, Drexel says she loves “gardening…Just put me out in the dirt all day long and I’d be happy. I love hard work.” Residents of Hampton Bays, she and her husband Mike have a son Roy, who, with his wife Kim and three children, lives in Southampton.