Thousands of dollars worth of toys were recently donated to the University of Iowa Stead Family Children’s Hospital by the Wellman Fire Department. Firefighter Tracy Owens explained that one of the firemen in the department’s daughter went to the hospital for cancer treatments earlier this year and that she is now doing well. The fire department decided to again donate toys to the children in the hospital. 

Owen shares what it was like to deliver the two Suburbans full of toys, “I jokingly said, ‘We might have too much.’ And [the hospital staff] said, ‘You cannot have enough.’ You know, it’s not just the holidays. You know, the families that are here, the children that spend months, years in that place, and the financial strain, but you know there’s so many of them that come in and out, but there’s always a child having a birthday or they just finished with some treatments and they receive toys. I know the fireman that’s on the department with us said several times that they brought toys into his daughter during her times up there. So it was a very heartfelt, wonderful thing when we took the toys up.”

He hopes next year to continue the community support and have the need to use an enclosed trailer to transport all of the toy donations.