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A rollicking riot of rapturous red and prolific purple will converge upon Town Hall at 11:30 a.m. Friday when seven local chapters of the international Red Hat Society receive proclamations declaring September 17, 2004 as “Red Hat Day” in Woodbridge.

The Red Hat Society is a loosely-knit, activity-centered social group for women over age fifty, a real-world replica of the nurturing female friendships popularized in the 2002 film Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood .

The Society's motto is “Fun and Friendship Before and After Fifty”, and members can be easily spotted wearing bright red hats and eye-catching purple garments while attending any of the numerous public events on the group's social calendar.

The Woodbridge chapters bear titles as colorful as their outfits: The Honey Bees , The Girls With Royal Hattitude , The Red Hat Amos Girls , The Colonia Red Hat Society , The Colonia Red Hat Diva Dollies , The Red Hat Gang of Purple Persuasion and the exceedingly un-PC-monickered Fords Broads.

“We are pleased to recognize a grass-roots movement that celebrates the vitality and uniqueness of women entering a new phase of their lives,” says Mayor Frank G. Pelzman . “The popularity of the Red Hat Society in Woodbridge is another example of the active lifestyle options available to our Township seniors.”

Red Hat Society devotees often fondly refer to the group as a “disorganization”. The first chapter was started in 1998 by several Fullerton, California, women inspired by the popular poem Warning by English poet Jenny Joseph , which begins “When I am an old woman...” and lists a litany of outrageous breeches of public decorum that include wearing purple “with a red hat that doesn't go”.

The idea of a women's group convening for fashion mischief and general merriment quickly spread beyond California, and Red Hat Society chapters now number in the thousands worldwide. And the age boundaries are elastic; the Society gleefully accepts women under fifty as “Pink Hatters”.

But the Society has an underlying serious intent: calling attention to the social marginalization of middle-aged and elderly women in a youth-obsessed society.

“Too many women feel invisible when they reach fifty,” says Sue Ellen Cooper , author of The Red Hat Society: Fun and Friendship After Fifty and a founder of the original California chapter. “The Society is a way to gain higher public visibility for women in our age group and to reshape the way we are viewed by today's culture.”

One thing is for certain: the Red Hat women of Woodbridge are far from invisible. And with Friday's proclamation of Red Hat Day, they will have taken one giant step for the next generation of Girls of a Certain Age who just want to have fun.