By: Diana Lewis
11/07/2005

Church nears goal of donating 5,500 wheelchairs to Third World countries

In July, the Rev. Glen Warner expressed a hope to "mobilize the community," in a common goal - to raise enough money to send 5,500 free wheelchairs through the Free Wheelchair Mission to Third World countries.

It appears that the community has not let him down. "We are within 726 chairs of our goal of 5,500," said the Warner, pastor of Second Congregational Church, located in the Ashtabula Harbor. "(Last) week, we broke the $200,000 mark, with $30,000 to go."

Warner's church is spearheading the regional effort to help former Ashtabula resident Don Schoendorfer and his "Free Wheelchair Mission" distribute 20 million of his inexpensive "all-terrain" chairs to Third World countries by 2010. The wheelchairs cost just $41.17 each to build and deliver to a needy disabled person in the Third World, Warner said.

Warner's church has led the effort, because Schoendorfer attended the church when he lived here. But the effort has become a coalition of the willing, with 25 other area churches actively participating, along with service organizations from as far away as Akron and Erie, Pa., Warner said.

"It's most heartening," he said. Grassroots efforts have boosted the bottom line. For example, a local day care center, ABC Childcare and Learning Center, on West 11th Street in Ashtabula, actually raised more than $1,000 by setting up a dunk tank with the center director in the "hot seat." There are two more fund-raiser events scheduled to push the local effort over the top. A dinner is planned for Nov. 26 at the Kathryn Rose Community Center, on North Bend Road in Ashtabula. Cost is $10 a ticket. The other event is a charity auction at the Harbor Golf Club, on Lake Road in Saybrook Township. It is set for Nov. 19, at a cost of $25 a ticket, Warner said.

For more information, or to purchase tickets for either event, call the church at (440) 964-9640. Schoendorfer is flying in for the week, and will be present at the auction, Warner added. He will also speak at the Community Thanksgiving Service on Nov. 22.

Schoendorfer and his wheelchair were featured in the July 2005 Reader's Digest magazine, in the "Everyday Heroes" section. Billed as the "world's cheapest wheelchair," the contraption blends bicycle wheels and a $3 plastic lawn chair into a "life-changing blessing to those whose existence is dragging themselves along the ground because of useless legs," Warner said.

Schoendorfer's dream was born 30 years ago in Morocco when he saw a disabled woman dragging herself along in the afternoon heat, using her fingernails to pull herself along. The MIT graduate was determined to design an affordable wheelchair. Since he hit on the design, Schoendorfer has provided more than 54,000 all-terrain wheelchairs to 43 countries. The recipients are victims of disease, land mines, abuse and sometimes torture during civil conflicts, Schoendorfer said. "We used to say, 'Change a life forever for $41.17,' " Schoendorfer said. "Now we see many lives changing for every wheelchair distributed. Free Wheelchair Mission gives dignity and mobility to the handicapped, hope to their family, benefit to their community, opportunity for ministry, and, for donors and deliverers of these wheelchairs, the joy of making a difference in the lives of those who truly need the 'gift of mobility.' "

Free Wheelchair Mission is a faith-based organization. It works with those in the mission field abroad to distribute them. Every wheelchair is delivered with a patch kit, an air pump and tools to keep the chair in good working order.