Story originally printed in the Holmen Courier or online at www.holmencourier.com

Published - Thursday, March 01, 2007

Beyond lutefisk and Jell-O: Talk to focus on women in Holmen Lutheran history

By ADAM BISSEN |Staff writer

The March meeting of the Holmen Area Historical Society hinges on something of a calendrical confluence.

The Holmen Lutheran Church is celebrating its 100th anniversary in 2007. March is women’s history month. Charged with assigning a topic for the March 7 HAHS meeting, program director Lynne Valiquette asked her neighbor, Judy Hoffman, to give a talk on the role women played in the HLC.

Hoffman, a 48-year member of the church and a women’s group participant for the last six years, thinks she is up for the task.

“I am fairly familiar with what has happened, although I was able to dig in the totes at church and find some new things,” Hoffman said.

Hoffman will give her talk on Wednesday, March 7, at the Holmen Village Hall. The public is invited to the free event, and refreshments will be served.

While the HLC is celebrating its centennial this year, Hoffman’s talk will go back even further in time. The first women’s group associated with the church was founded in 1899, before the church was even built.

Originally called Ladies’ Aid, members started raising money to support an area parochial school but later shifted their focus to church construction efforts. The women’s society purchased the pews, altar and carpet for the church and also applied several hundred dollars to other projects, Hoffman said.

While the women’s organization raised funds through serving lunch and coffee, they also charged weekly dues of 5 cents for all members.

“This continued into the ’40s, and I remember my grandmother getting ready to go to Ladies Aid and wrapping a quarter into the corner of her handkerchief. That was her offering,” said Hoffman, a retired Holmen resident and vice-president of the HAHS.

On Jan. 22, 1953, the original Holmen Lutheran Church was destroyed by a fire. Even today, the origin of the blaze is unknown.

The Ladies Aid association was supposed to meet at the church the next morning, but immediately moved their meeting to the Holmen Village Hall to plan reconstruction efforts.

Around 20 years ago the Ladies Aid association changed its name to the Women of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, but the tradition of providing aid lives on. Every year WELCA donates money to support Sugar Creek Bible Camp, the New Horizons Shelter and Womens’ Center, Lutheran World Relief and a jail ministry.

While doing research for her talk, Hoffman said she learned an interesting fact about the Ladies Aid association. The organization was founded on the east coast by a woman who invited other ladies over to her home on Tuesdays to make quilts that they would later sell.

“We do more than just Jell-O,” said Nancy Folkedahl, the current office manager at HLC.

Around 10-15 women still meet every Tuesday morning at HLC to quilt. Hoffman, who attends regularly, called the process “industrial” and said the women send between 100-200 quilts every year to Lutheran World Relief, who will distribute them after a natural disaster.

“They enjoy it. They enjoy visiting with each other while they’re quilting. I’m not sure why they all come,” Hoffman said. “I guess they feel there is a need.”

Contact Adam Bissen at 786-6813 or adam.bissen@lee.net.

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