NORMAL - Before Illinois State University tears down its oldest dorms this summer to make room for a $43.9 million student fitness center, thousands of items will be salvaged from the nearly 60-year-old Walker and Dunn-Barton halls. From bunkbeds to doorknobs to hallway "exit" signs, what can be recycled is being saved.

"We want to keep things out of the landfill," said Maureen Blair, ISU's university housing director. But the turnaround time is brief: Dorms closed last Sunday. "We only have about two weeks to salvage what we want before asbestos removal starts," she said.

Some items, such as conference room furniture, will move to various ISU buildings. Others will be stored in a warehouse for later use, or move to other state institutions, said Blair. The rest is donated or thrown away.

"We do our best to look for agencies in need," said Blair of the remaining items.

ISU is giving much of the furniture to nonprofit agencies that help the needy in Central Illinois and around the world. Interestingly, that means hundreds of mattresses, desks and chairs that once filled Walker Hall - longtime home to ISU's international house and Global Review program - now will be used by Iraqis, Afghanis, Tanzanians and Hondurans.

The largest single donation is more than 2,200 mattresses to St. Mary's Catholic Church in Bloomington for its St. Anthony Outreach Ministry.

The university has donated items to registered nonprofit agencies for several years, said Blair. But the combination of central campus facing the wrecking ball, Manchester Hall closing for renovation, and four other dorms getting new mattresses means a higher than typical donation, she said.

Other donations include 800 desk chairs and 200 dressers to Bloomington-based Recycling for Families; and nearly 900 bunk-bed frames and 700 desks to New Day Church in Decatur.

Mattresses going to families, refugees, medical clinic

The grassroots St. Anthony group, organized by St. Mary's parishioner Jeannine Montgomerie, will distribute the mattresses to several Central Illinois families; to a charity helping Iraqi and Afghan war refugees living in Kentucky; and to a Catholic nun operating a medical clinic and school in Central America. Also via St. Anthony's, 200 ISU desks will make their way to Tanzania.

On Tuesday morning, during the first of several volunteer shifts this month, about 20 St. Mary's parishioners helped. John and Judy Oakley and Katie O'Dea were among several who stood at the edge of a second-floor Walker Hall balcony, forming a line to pass twin mattresses from the building to volunteer Peter Millburg and others waiting inside a semi-tractor trailer truck.

The truck, the third of the day, was heading to Honduras, with transportation being provided by the Milwaukee-based Daniel Meehan Foundation, said loading organizer John Lally of Bloomington.

"It's nice we're able to use these resources to help out people," said Bill Ducett of Normal, an ISU education professor and St. Mary's parishioner. With classes done, he had some free time for the St. Anthony project.

"It's been going for about a year now," Ducett said of the ministry. "After Father Beiting came to talk at Mass, it really got some people fired up - Jeannine Montgomerie in particular," he said.

Monsignor Ralph Beiting, a Catholic priest who has spent decades in Louisa, Ky., shared his stories of the plights of Appalachia to parishioners last year. He asked for their help.

"I knew there had to be some response beyond writing a check," said Montgomerie, who also joined volunteers Tuesday at Walker.

She named the group for St. Anthony, the patron saint of lost items. "Boy - and I tell you, he's come through in a big way," she said.

After the group asked the community to fill a semi-tractor trailer with household goods for Appalachia, word began to spread about the ministry.

Soon they were helping local people who've fallen through the cracks too, she said.

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How to help

St. Anthony Outreach Ministry, a local charity group, is picking up more than 2,200 mattresses from Illinois State University in the next month. The items will be used locally, and shipped to Kentucky and Honduras. Volunteers are needed to help load mattresses onto trucks.

To help: Call John Lally at (309) 828-6898 or by e-mail at JohnPLally@comcast.net.

Volunteers are needed for 2-hour shifts on Monday and Tuesday from 8:30 a.m. to noon, Walker Hall; Tuesday, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Manchester Hall; June 16, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., Atkin-Colby halls; June 17, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., Hamilton-Whitten halls.

For more information about the group: Call Jeannine Montgomerie at (309) 452-6437 or e-mail her at jam1711@comcast.net

SOURCE: St. Anthony Outreach Ministry