VARINA - Iowa's "Quilt Lady" just wanted to ease someone's suffering.
She didn't plan to be a hero.
Yet the Varina grandmother, recently inducted into the Iowa Volunteer Hall of Fame, is as much a hero to the families who lost loved ones in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, as the heroes they lost.
"That's what they call me," said Betty Nielsen, fighting away the mist filling her eyes. "They call me the Quilt Lady."
She stops short of repeating the part about being a hero.
Nielsen and her husband, Dennis, and a group of women from the Varina Methodist and Catholic churches continue the work Nielsen started after the 9/11 attacks when she spearheaded an immediate call to make and send five quilts to families of victims. Sort of an "I'm so sorry" token from America's heartland.
One quilt would go to a family of a firefighter - requested by helper Patty Archer in honor of her brother, a fireman killed in an Albert City explosion.
Another would go to someone from the Pentagon disaster because both the Nielsens were in the Air Force. The other three would go to people with ties to Iowa.
As it turned out, one of the quilts, which the 55-year-old Nielson calls "War Paint," stayed with her to be used when she would talk about her project to others, asking for donations of money or quilt blocks, even finished quilts.
"War Paint," however, has finally found a home - it will hang in the World Trade Tribute Center to honor those lost on 9/11. When the new Freedom Tower is built, the museum will move there. Lee Ielpi, head of the Tribute Center, lost a son, but never accepted a quilt. Until now.
Nielsen's original plan of sending five quilts soon ballooned to one quilt for every family who lost someone on that fateful day. She'd received an outpouring of help, not only from area quilters, but from around the world. Quilts poured into her from Japan, Australia, Germany, Italy - so many places aghast at the attacks.
On her first trip to New York with 1,554 quilts, she planned to give one quilt to each family, coming back at a later date with however many quilts needed. As the families gathered, some too stricken yet to talk, she watched a 5-year-old boy beg his mother for the quilt he wanted. She wanted something different.
Again, Nielsen's eyes reddened as she said, "that little boy was crying out, 'Mommy, I've got to have this quilt.' It was the quilt that had 'Jesus Loves Me' on it."
She gave the youngster the quilt and gave his mother the quilt she wanted.
"God wanted me to realize I had to open up my eyes and my heart," Nielsen said. "It was too heartbreaking to say just one quilt per family. They wanted something tangible. They wanted something to hold on to. We couldn't say no."
The quilting project is known as Freedom Quilts.
When Nielsen sends quilts out for special requests, she writes letters to go with them. Among her first letters was that to a 5-year-old boy who had lost his grandfather at the World Trade Center.
"I told the little boy if he wrapped himself in his quilt, he could feel his grandpa's arms around him," she said. "I saw that little boy when he was 10 years old when we went to New York for the fifth anniversary event. He heard I was in the building and ran up three floors to find me. He wrapped his arms around me and said, 'Thank you. I don't have nightmares any more because I can feel my grandpa's arms around me.'"
Even before this kind of feedback, Nielsen didn't worry about how many quilts would be needed. She came home from her first trip and continued to work. Sometimes around the clock.
The Nielsens farm near Varina. She couldn't ignore her workload there, so she used her off time to work on quilts. There were nights when sleep wasn't an option.
She sent out letters to ask for help. Fabric doesn't come cheaply. The little group of church women worked long days, Nielsen said. This project couldn't have been done without them.
It's work she knows came to her as God's will she will not stop. And though it's said that money for God's projects will never run out, Dennis Nielsen laughs and says "no, because there was always my pocketbook. But there were some lean times."
Betty Nielsen said quilts have been sent to those who have asked - every person in every family who lost someone in the terrorist attacks in New York City and the Pentagon. The project would be over, except in 2003, the mother of a soldier lost at war asked if she could get a quilt.
And, as before, Nielsen wouldn't say no.
Contact Sandy Mickelson at (515) 573-2141 or smickelson@messengernews.net
