Elkader reaches out to victims of EF4 tornado in Kentucky
In May, Marvin Duff (left) and John Nikolai delivered home furnishings donated from Elkader to Mayfield, Ky., a community hit by an EF4 tornado. (Submitted photos)
Families gathered at the Grave County Fairground to collect the donated items.
By John Nikolai, Special to the Times-Register
Shortly after Christmas 2021, Carla Pady read a newspaper article about the massive destruction of one-third of Mayfield, Ky., a city with a population of over 10,000. The candle factory employing over 200 was totally destroyed, so not only did residents lose their homes but also their jobs.
Carla, recalling the impact of the derecho storm in Iowa, decided to help the people in Mayfield and started to contact Elkader churches, pastors, organizations and folks who could help.
The former Elkader Inn Motel had been sold with usable furniture, plus The Outlet was closing, having bed linens available, so two sources of household furnishings were available.
The next problem was to move, store and ship all the household goods to the victims of the tornado.
Carla recruited Leonard Beiderman, Ken and JoAnn Fishel and others to move the household goods to Carla’s neighbor, Maggie Hayford’s, garage and basement. Meanwhile, she contacted One in Faith, Bethany Lutheran, Peace United Church of Christ, First Congregational, St. Joseph’s and all Elkader churches plus the Knights of Columbus for donations, not only of household goods but also funds to pay for gasoline to transport the goods to Mayfield. Others who helped were Mike McShane at GEAR, Sally McGreal, Tim and Mike Harbough (lamp electrical repair) and Pastor Tony Ede of First Lutheran Church of Manchester.
Carla also reached out to Mary Bates of North American Lutheran Church disaster relief in Ohio, but they didn’t have a truck or drivers to transport the load as they were currently sending a truck to Louisiana.
One day, I was coming out of the post office and Carla stopped me and asked if I would like to go to Kentucky. I was taken back until she explained what she had been doing to help out the residents of Mayfield. A farmer who was going to take the load with his truck and trailer had a health problem in the family, so dropped out, and, of course, here in agriculture country, farmers were busy getting in their crops. I told her I would consider the trip and would get back to her in a few days. I tried to find someone to accompany me, as long trips need a relief driver plus if there are problems two hands are better than one. Finally, I was able to get Marvin Duff from our American Legion in Elkader to accompany me.
Next was checking my vintage 1999 dual fuel pickup getting properly set up with the correct trailer hitch, etc., and getting help to load the NAPA trailer that gave Carla a special rate.
It was a hot day on May 11, but everything was ready, so I called my Motor Mill Foundation volunteers, Chris Schoen, Dan Slagel and Lee Lenth, plus Carla Pady and Maggie Hayford, and loaded the trailer. Maggie’s basement and garage was finally empty and we were all soaking wet. We really appreciated being able to use Central Plumbing & Heating’s appliance cart because the motel chest of drawers were full of blankets, quilts, bed linens, etc., and were very awkward and heavy. We all went home and took a shower and fell into bed.
We left at 6 a.m. on May 12, and drove all the way to Metropolis, Ill., and overnighted at a Super 8 motel. Because we wanted to reduce our gasoline purchases, we made deviations from the route to buy propane and were able to limit our gasoline purchases by burning propane at reduced costs. May 13 was a better day and we had an appointment to be unloaded in Mayfield at the fairgrounds at 9 a.m.
We finished unloading with plenty of help in about an hour and we have a complete list of items from the unloading at the Graves County Fairgrounds. As the unloading continued, numerous people and families gathered and many of the furniture items were claimed on the spot. We were amazed at the organization and huge buildings housing clothing and household goods. People were identified as they came into the area to gather needed items and we received all the information in less than a week from Mayfield.
We left Mayfield after filling with gas since we wanted to spend some money in the area. This was our first exposure to a tornado, and even after nearly six months, the damage was still everywhere. The statistics on deaths was a total of 77 people killed in the storm. Many people have opened their homes to those who lost theirs, but it was obvious the population had shrunk. No work and no pay and living off charity, governmental agencies, etc., is a burden to anyone, and I’m sure many have left the area who could afford to.
Our trip home was uneventful and we followed our route back as we knew where the propane service was and arrived in Elkader shortly after midnight on May 14.
We were glad to be able to leave the area and urge all to pray for the survivors of these terrible storms and be thankful to have not had to experience such a tragedy.
John Nikolai is a Knights of Columbus member and Marvin Duff is an American Legion member.
