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# Cleft palate volunteers honored By Daily Press staff
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/cleft-palate-volunteers-honored-by-daily-press-staff/
- Published: 2004-08-02T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T04:47:08.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Health, Santa Monica, #archive-import

The Native Sons of the Golden West, a group of more than 9,000 individuals committed to improving the health of children, were honored with a celebratory mass and brunch this past Sunday in appreciation for the group’s support of Saint John’s Health Center’s Cleft Palate Center. More than 100 Native Sons, doctors and nurses from the cleft palate team as well as families helped by the center attended.

With this year’s donation of $50,000, the group, which has been supporting the Cleft Palate Center for more than 35 years, has now passed the $1 million mark of funds donated to the program.

The Cleft Palate Center at Saint John’s Health Center was founded in 1965, making it one of the first teams in Los Angeles providing coordinated state-of-the-art medical care in a community setting. Led by Janet Salomonson, MD, the team includes several plastic and reconstructive surgeons, a pediatrician, speech pathologists, otolaryngologists, audiologists, orthodontists, prosthodontists, nurses and social workers — all of whom are especially skilled in the care and management of children and adults with clefts, hospital officials said. More than 2,000 children from Southern California have received treatment at the Center.

The Native Sons of the Golden West was originally organized to keep alive the memory of pioneers who helped settle California. The statewide group first became involved in helping children with craniofacial defects at the University of California, San Francisco in 1956 and began their support of Saint John’s Health Center in 1969.

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on August 2, 2004.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/080204.pdf?ref=smdp.com)