Harriett Friedland

Husband: Jack A. Friedland, plastic surgeon
Heart Ball Chair: 1984
Money raised: $95,000-$100,000
Advice: “Heart Ball chairs need to have fun, make friends and be inclusive. It’s about making money, not spending it.”

For the past 30 years, Harriett Friedland’s prestigious modeling career has had her gracing the pages of many glossy publications, but 25 years ago she was asked to smile for a different cause. After joining the 1983 Heart Ball committee, members asked if she would graciously chair the 1984 ball. She was thrilled to accept.

During the time in which Friedland was chairwoman, the Valley was much less populated with far less attention on glitz and glamour.

“We didn’t have advisors, it was much simpler then. When you were the chair you just did it,” she says. But then again, the event was done on a much smaller scale as well.

“My year, about six weeks before the event we had so many people coming, around 600, we had to move the event from the Arizona Biltmore’s Grand Ballroom to the Conference Center Ballroom. That was a real panic. We only had so many centerpieces and so much financing for the centerpieces,” Friedland recalls. But, the committee (which consisted of 10 women) made do and the evening went off without a hitch.