Our Donors' Stories

Helping Hands Establishes Endowment
Miami County Helping Hands, Inc. celebrated its sixth year of serving those in need in our community this month. Since opening its doors, the interdenominational, non-governmental food pantry has provided short-term emergency assistance to well over 2500 Miami County families. Helping Hands has also developed programs that provide assistance with heating bills and prescription medicines.
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Scholarship Created to Memorialize Peru Educator, Jan Nowling
The Miami County Community Foundation is pleased to have a new scholarship which honors the memory of a beloved teacher of Peru High School. The Janice Nowling Memorial Scholarship was first made available for 2008 graduating seniors of Peru High School.
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Growing a better Miami County with Agency Funds
Over the past 14 years, the Miami County Community Foundation has worked hard to establish a reputation of effectiveness; not only for meeting money with need, but for being a convener in our community as well as a catalyst for positive change.
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Starke/Pulaski Board of Realtors
Starke/Pulaski Board of Realtors have created a new scholarship through the Starke County
Community Foundation. The scholarship is for deserving graduating seniors from Starke County High School, or who are Starke County residents, who plan to pursue a degree in business at any Indiana college, university, trade or vocational school.
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Dorothy Johnson Shei — Celebrate the Life
In celebration of the life and memory of Dorothy Johnson Shei, her family has recently created a scholarship through the Starke County Community Foundation.
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Jim Hardesty — A Life of Giving Back
"I have to feel, as I have always felt, that you have to do for your community," Starke County Community Foundation board member, Jim Hardesty said, "and I've been very lucky."
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New Starke County 4-H Agency Fund
Starke County Community Foundation and Starke County 4-H Council not only met their goal, but they exceeded it by over $6,000. During the sixty day fundraising campaign, the agencies raised over $16,000 total to create a permanently endowed fund for the 4-H Council's ongoing needs.
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Coach John Nelson: Champion of Fulton County
In the golden age of Hoosier basketball, there were many memorable figures that played out David and Goliath moments on the court. Sometimes the smaller schools, like David, would triumph, but most times the big schools would win. Whatever the outcome, the stories of the games and the tales of great coaches and players still resonate in the Hoosier psyche and inspire us today.
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St. Charles Receives Gift that Will Last a Lifetime
Josephine Radel dreamt of creating a fund for St. Charles Borromeo School.
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Akron Community Center
Akron Indiana is a town that cares about its future and the people that make
it a hometown to be proud of.
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First Cole Porter Scholarship Recipient Gives Back to Community
Dr. Peggy Bennett remembers the day 40 years ago, when her band director Jim Noble called her into his office.
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Pat Malaska's Legacy Lives on in Miami County Through a New Fund
Packed into the Tigarena, Peru's fans were on their feet. Their yells were deafening as they cheered the 1948 Tigers onto a Sectional victory. It was that golden era of basketball, when little town teams were pitted against big city teams. Victory lead Peru to Regional's at a bigger gym, in a bigger town, with a bigger crowd.
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Starke County Community Foundation Sponsors Poster
The Starke County Community Foundation sponsored a poster in coordination with the Starke County Tourism Commission. The poster is the second in the series and was created by renowned local artist Mitchell Markovitz.
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How to Grow a Legacy: Creating a Memorial Scholarship
Memorial scholarships are a wonderful way to celebrate a life and carry on the good works of a loved one. By creating a permanently endowed memorial scholarship fund with Miami County Community Foundation, you can be assured that your loved one's name—their legacy—continues to positively impact members of our community forever.
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My Mother, "Winnie"
My Mother, "Winnie," was a person of great strength and influence as well as a role model for her daughters and other young women.  My Mother was also a Registered Nurse.  She believed in her profession and always encouraged my sister and I to become nurses.  She felt women should have no boundaries or limits in the "corporate" world and that a woman could be anything she wanted to be.  My Mother largely shaped the person I became, and influenced my decision to become a Registered Nurse.
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Marks Family Fund
Going through family photographs and videos in order to make a memorial DVD was a labor of love for Kevin Marks. He was preparing it for a dedication ceremony that he had coordinated in order to present the Miami County Museum with the fund that was created in honor of his father Otis—a long-time volunteer of the museum.
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Mrs. Marne Dyer
I had the privilege of knowing Mrs. Marne Dyer not only as one of my high school English teachers but also as a colleague here at Rochester High School. It is very fitting that her family has decided to work with the Northern Indiana Community Foundation, Inc. to fund a program that promotes literacy, for Marne believed in the power of words, both spoken and written. Moreover, she kept a quotation on one of her bulletin boards that said, "The service we give to other people is the rent we pay to take up space on this earth." As the daughter of a Methodist minister, Marne always strove to serve her students whether it was in the classroom or in her extracurricular activity, the RHS Speech Team.
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