By JANE ROBERTS
Scripps Howard News Service
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
They amble into class on crutches and canes and in wheelchairs. Class officially starts at 10 a.m., but 10:20 is not late. Neither is 10:40. These are America's veterans. Many rely on public transportation.
The volunteers in the FedEx Retiree Club know that. Using Memphis as a template, they are building a nationwide network all over again, this time concentrating on what they can do to help patients in Veterans Affairs medical centers. There are 163 nationwide.
For starters, they are offering free amateur-radio training Tuesday and Thursday mornings at the VA hospital in Memphis.
"We think it can lead to some very nice vocational opportunities for these guys," said Ken Pfohl, chaplain of the retirees' club and chairman of the chaplain's care committee, a group of former FedExers eager to make a difference.
"The club paid for the training manuals, which cost $24.95, and we'll also pay the fee for the FCC licensing test," Pfohl said. "The vets will have no out-of-pocket expenses whatsoever."
At least 10 veterans -- of wars from Vietnam to Iraq -- enrolled in the course, including Christopher Elmore, a retired Navy man who served from 1960 to 1979 and believes in arming himself with skills in case of an emergency.
"This way if anybody ever needs me, I might be able to help," he said over a pile of ham-radio homework in a physical-therapy room now a radio classroom at the VA.
Service in times of emergency was part of the original idea, said Joe Lowenthal, head of training for the Delta Amateur Radio Club, FedEx retiree and liaison between the hospital and the Amateur Radio Emergency Service.
"Because the VA has more long-term patients than any other hospital, I thought it would be a wonderful opportunity for the patients and it would also give the hospital radio operators 24 hours a day, seven days a week."
Military service gave lots of people radio experience, including the Military Affiliate Radio System, fondly remembered among service people as the amateur-radio operators who helped them patch calls through to home.
"We thought they might like to have ham-radio experience, too," Lowenthal said. "For many, it ties into skills they already have."
The retirees say they are finding out what works, what money they can raise and what kind of events they can easily sponsor.
"Once we have that template put together, we hope to export it to all VA hospitals."
Since July, the FedEx retirees have procured coffee donations for Java for Vets. They have given away more than $1,000 from the club's concessions at University of Memphis ball games and have adopted the 19-room on-site extended-care hotel the VA offers free to outpatients and family members who need a place to stay for extended treatment.
On a Tuesday morning, retiree Diane Fiveash walked through the spare rooms, some equipped with only mismatched bed and nightstand, with the eye of an interior decorator.
"We're looking for opportunities to make the rooms more comfortable," she said, quickly scanning window heights for curtain measurements. "We think the mattresses could be updated. And we're looking at adding clock radios."
With more than 900 members across the country, the retirees said they were looking for a charity that would reflect their far-flung nature and their own experience.
"We realized the amount of money we could raise as a club, for instance, was a fraction of what FedEx already does for St. Jude with the golf tournament," Pfohl said.
"So we looked around at something else we could do locally. It just jumped right off the page. When we polled our members in Memphis, it turned out about 85 percent were also veterans," he said. "It made sense. It's been a perfect marriage."
The club had about 350 members until the company offered a buyout to its more senior staff in the fall of 2003.
Within months, enrollment had more than doubled. Until now, they've volunteered as individuals, not a unified FedEx group.
"Their interest is spreading like a plague," said Dr. Remson Ellsworth, a spinal-care physician who takes a personal interest in the group's work because he's helped brainstorm ideas.
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