Spotlight
Making masks saves local business, answers community call for help By David Mullen Gannett
4 | FACETS | JUNE 2020
F
or Ames Main Street’s Threadit owner Janae Smith, March 23 was a tough day — the day she decided to close the doors to her business to encourage her customers to stay home. Although business had slowed down a bit, she said, customers were still coming to the store daily, and Smith felt guilty about it. “Customers were still coming in my shop and I felt that I was encouraging people to come out and run their normal errands,” Smith said. “I didn’t want to feel responsible for the spread of (COVID-19), and I thought of it as my social responsibility.” After two weeks of closure, however, the Iowa State University graduate began to feel the hardship. At that point, she wasn’t sure how much longer the business, which does tailoring, could last.Then, after seeing an increasing number of medical facilities like Mary Greeley and McFarland Clinic ask for personal protective equipment, she thought she could use her skills to save her business. “I knew there would be a great demand (for masks) in the area, and the best way to get masks to your local community is by sourcing them locally,” Smith said. “So yes, I wanted to answer the call for help, but it was also a strategic business move to save my business.” Since April 3, Smith and six of her associates have produced more than 350 masks to sell and have donated nearly 100 to Mary Greeley Medical Center and Youth and Shelter Services [YSS]. “We couldn’t operate the way we currently are at the hospital if we didn’t have these donations,” said Vicki Newell, manager of volunteer and older adult services at Mary Greeley Medical Center. “We can’t even begin (to say) how grateful we are.” Many others throughout the Ames and Story County communities have also answered the call for personal protective equiptment, including an Ames Police dispatcher, local 4-H groups and a grandmother in Kelley. “(Helping others) is just a way of life, and you don’t really think of it like that, but if you can (help in any way) you should,” said Angie Van Westen, a dispatcher for the Ames Police Department. “I have the ability (to sew) so I do that and I’ll keep doing that if it means I’m helping others.” Although these are unprecedented times and many fear the potential impact COVID-19 could have on the economy, their loved ones and their daily lives, Ames and Story County residents have always shown an ability to take action when needed in the past. At the beginning of 1942, shortly after President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared war on the Axis alliance in World War II, the Collegiate Manufacturing Co. in Ames decided to change ira production of caps and gowns for Iowa State students to raincoats and ponchos for the U.S.
JANAE SMITH POSES OUTSIDE OF THREADIT IN DOWNTOWN AMES, WHERE SHE HAS SWITCHED HER A TAILOR BUSINESS TO CREATING MASKS DURING THIS PANDEMIC. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
Army Quartermaster Corps, said Alex Fejfar, exhibits manager at the Ames Historical Museum. Collegiate Manufacturing “was one of the first companies to get big nationally for producing products for colleges in the Midwest and nationally, but when World War II hit, they stopped production of graduation caps and gowns and starting using their large work force to support the cause,” Fejfar said. At the time, the company had two buildings on the sites the Octagon Art Center and McClanahan Studio now occupy in the 200 block of Fifth Street. It received the Army Navy “E” award for its efforts, an honor given to only 3% of companies that assisted with wartime production, Fejfar said. Harley Wilhelm, of Ames, who was in charge of production at the Ames Laboratory at the time and played an essential part in the Manhattan Project that produced the first atomic bombs, also received the prestigious honor, Fejfar said. So for businesses in Ames and residents of Story County to be answering a call at times of need is no surprise to Fejfar.
