Shirley Stump is making a difference by devoting her retirement years to helping her community through the State College Woman’s Club.
Joe and Lucy Loomis felt welcomed by their church and have been sharing that gift with others ever since.
From his daughter’s health crisis, Devon Still built a foundation to help other families going through similar challenges.
While their motivations, their gifts, and their stories are very different, there are some striking similarities. All exude positivity and a sense of optimism about the future, and each express some version of the same sentiment: “How could I not do this?” Their experiences are inspiring, showing that there are endless avenues for each of us to make a difference in our own way.
This is part 2 of 2 of Town&Gown‘s annual profiles of People Making a Difference. Part 1 — featuring Christy Delafield, Diane Kramer and Barry Peters — can be viewed here.
Shirley Stump: ‘Going and going and going’
In the 25 years since she retired, Shirley Stump has been making a difference in the community through the Woman’s Club of State College. At 91, she doesn’t show any signs of slowing down. As the president of the club, she manages the organization and works to keep it viable in these changing times.
“It fills my life. Once I retired, I didn’t have anything to do,” says Stump. “It was a challenge, but it has been my life. I am 91, and the reason I am 91 is because I kept going and going and going. If I had sat down, I wouldn’t be here.”
The Woman’s Club was founded 125 years ago in a very different time, but its message and mission still matter. In 1894, State College was not yet a borough and there was no electricity and no water or sewer system. But Penn State was growing and Frances Atherton, the wife of Penn State’s seventh president, Dr. George Atherton, moved to town with her family and started the Woman’s Literary Club of State College. This later became the State College Woman’s Club. Among its many contributions to the community through the years is a thrift shop that operates on Thursdays from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.
“The ladies had trouble getting clothes during the war, so the ladies gave up their clothes that didn’t fit anymore into a little shop so people could have new clothes. That is how the thrift shop began,” Stump says.
Now the not-for-profit thrift shop offers a chance for people in the area to recycle their old but still good clothes, home goods, and more, providing quality second-hand goods at low prices.
The money raised at the shop then goes back into the community to nonprofits such as the Park Forest Day Nursery, Meals On Wheels, Millbrook Marsh, State College Food Bank, and the Centre County Women’s Resource Center. After maintaining its building and paying taxes, the club donated almost $30,000 last year to various nonprofits.
It is a cycle of giving that benefits many in State College, and Stump and her team keep it all going strong. But it isn’t easy.
The club, at 902 South Allen Street, looks immaculate. All the clothes and goods are organized and orderly. The shop stays busy with customers who come to see what is new, because you never know what you might find: a pair a hip-waders, an oil painting, or maybe a vintage Elvis Presley lunch box. There is interesting stuff galore.
Visitors might find Stump putting things in order. She is full of energy, enthusiasm and stories.
She worked for years at Riverside Market in Altoona and State College, bringing her retail experience with her when she joined the club. She started working as a cashier at the thrift shop and was soon asked to manage the store.
Even as president of the club, she remains involved with the thrift store, partly because there are fewer people around to help out now.
Club membership is a far cry from its heyday, and Stump thinks it’s because women are involved in so many things these days. She understands.
“Even women’s recreation has changed. I was born in ’28; we had nothing but a radio. I remember when television came in and when phones became classic instead of cellular,” says Stump.
But she still feels the club is a great place for women to stay active, build relationships, and make a difference in the community.
Stump comes in every day and checks the shop’s donation box. With a team, she helps organize the donations, keeps the store looking tip-top, and relishes all the connections she’s made. She encourages anyone interested in joining to stop by, “because you just have to be here and talk to [the club members]. They are all just such wonderful people. They all have a goal in mind to make a difference and it is something that I really approve of. And I know it has been good for me health-wise or else I wouldn’t be here.
“I have these friends here and they know me from way back. I really enjoy what I do, and it is no big deal,” says Stump.
But for the community members who come into the thrift shop and the nonprofits that receive the donations, it is a big deal.
Joe and Lucy Loomis: Warm and welcoming
On a Wednesday in November, Joe Loomis had to take a break to answer a phone call. He was busy putting a heating pump in at University Baptist and Brethren Church in State College, but he was good enough to stop and answer his phone. He was kind as could be, even though he was in the middle of a big project. It seems like kindness is his general disposition.
Loomis gives his time on Wednesdays performing maintenance projects along with some other guys (including local running legend George Etzweiler) at the church that he and his wife, Lucy, have been a part of since 1968.
“We did that every Wednesday morning for years. George retired, but he is still a resource,” Joe says.
Etzweiler still helps out with the electrical stuff from time to time, and Joe, a retired engineer, keeps things running smoothly at the old stone church at 411 South Burrowes Street, making sure that the buildings have heat and running water.
Joe and Lucy felt at home in the church community right away because of its inclusivity. Back then, in the late 1960s, people typically got dressed up in their Sunday best for church, but she remembers seeing a family that dressed a little more comfortably. She says the kids acted like they were at home in the church, and that meant something to her: that everyone was welcome and felt comfortable.
Lucy also remembers the flowers decorating the church that day. They were simple flowers picked from a garden, not a fancy bouquet from a florist.
“I loved that; it was just simple,” she says. “It didn’t have to be fancy stuff up there, and the people were warm. We were new and it was welcoming in every way.”
That approach continues. The church became the first in the area to officially welcome the LGBTQ community back in 1999, at time when that stance was controversial.
“I don’t know that we were part of it, but we were trying to be more welcoming,” says Joe. “Some of those who were gay in the church came out to the church, and they were traumatized by that process in the past, at other churches. We decided that we would take a stand, so we took a vote to say that we would become welcoming and affirming of all genders. The first vote, that I happened to be moderator at, was a 50-50 vote.”
Through committee discussions within the church over the next couple of years, church members voted again on becoming welcoming and affirming, this time voting 98-2 in favor, Joe says.
“It was incredible, it really was. I don’t think we lost any families,” he says. “I think the process and discussion took away a lot of the fear.”
“I think once you get to know somebody that you love, that makes a difference in a group,” says Lucy.
Ever involved in the church community, once a year Joe gets dressed up in a farmer’s hat and overalls; you can call him Farmer Joe. It is not for Halloween; it is for the Alternative Christmas Fair at the church, where he volunteers at a nonprofit booth for another organization near and dear to his heart: Heifer International, which works to end hunger around the world by providing livestock and agricultural training to people in need.
Joe and Lucy Loomis. Photo by Darren Andrew Weimert.
The Alternative Christmas Fair took place this year on December 8, providing holiday gift-givers an option to give something other than material goods for the holidays. Volunteers from 28 local and international charities were on hand at the event, and people could receive cards for loved ones noting that a contribution was made to a worthy organization.
‘It is a wonderful event,” says Joe. “Some people buy whole cows that go to needy people; one person, she loves chickens and so she buys a flock of chicks. She doesn’t get a tangible flock of chicks, but in her name a flock of chicks goes to people who need it.”
Joe started as a volunteer at Heifer International in the late 1950s for a few months doing mailings, and he continues to believe in the work of the organization because he has seen the benefits firsthand.
“In Honduras I saw a beautiful example of a heifer that was donated that was helping to eliminate malnourishment in a village,” he says.
Through work with another organization, he saw the animals that were donated through Heifer making a difference in Ghana.
“There is one town that you went to and they said that [they] would be hungry if it weren’t for these animals,” says Lucy.
“They find a malnourished child and they give them goat’s milk and they eliminate malnourishment, and they even raised enough money to build a road to their town,” Joe says. “It was incredible.”
And so are Joe and Lucy.
Devon and Leah Still: Shared strength
There was nothing that could prepare Devon Still for how much it hurt the day doctors told him that his little girl had cancer.
Not the struggles he had growing up in Wilmington, Delaware, where he sometimes veered down the wrong path.
Not the pain he felt when he tore the ACL and MCL in his knee during his freshman year as a defensive lineman on the Penn State football team, nor the broken leg as a sophomore.
Not the difficult hours of rehab that he put in training rooms to get back on the field and the work he did to become a team leader.
Not being a team captain at Penn State during its darkest hours, answering difficult questions from the media during his senior year.
Nor the mounting injuries that kept sidelining him as a pro, limiting his promising career.
None of those things hurt as much as the thought that he might lose his 4-year old daughter, Leah, to a rare form of cancer. Not even close.
But, he says all those experiences did help give him the strength he needed to fight. The strength he needed to never give up hope. The strength to be there for his daughter when she needed him.
And now, with Leah approaching the huge milestone of five years in remission – where doctors say she can be considered cured – Devon and Leah are “Still Strong” and continue to fight with the hope that someday no child will have to go through what Leah and her loved ones went through.
Their Still Strong Foundation is making a difference in the fight against pediatric cancer by providing families with resources they need to still be strong. Still is sharing with those families some of the strength he gained at Penn State.
“When I dealt with those things at Penn State, I learned a lot about myself. I learned about discipline; I was able to cultivate a very resilient mindset. If I didn’t go through those two years of struggling, I don’t think I would have had the mindset I did when Leah was battling cancer,” he says.
In October, the first Still Strong Foundation Golf Outing was held at Toftrees Golf Resort in State College. The event allowed Still to connect with the Penn State community that he calls a family and raise money for his and Leah’s continued fight to help others. He hopes for it to grow even bigger next year in round two.
“Penn State is the first place that I learned about childhood cancer, just being a part of THON and just seeing everything that the university does to help families that are battling cancer,” Still says. “And when Leah was battling cancer, the Penn State community really rallied behind us and showed us a lot of support, so I wanted to make sure that I did an event there so people could hear and see what we are doing with the foundation.”
While Devon Still was there for his daughter Leah during her battle with cancer, she was there for him as well.
Their story is well known. Here was Still, living his NFL dream but dealing with another injury. He dropped everything to be with his daughter as she fought her battle with cancer, putting his career on hold. The sports world rallied behind him and soon it was a story that touched people across the country. Through the power of social media, Leah’s and Devon’s strength gave people hope, and it still does.
There is a picture of the two of them from that time, Leah without her hair because of the cancer treatments she was enduring, Devon with his head shaved in solidarity. In the picture, Leah is kissing her dad’s head.
“When I look at the picture, that whole time I thought that I was looking over my daughter, but I felt during that moment in the picture that my angel was looking over me, because there were a lot of things that I was battling mentally as far as fighting not to lose my daughter and fighting not to lose my career,” Still says. “So, in that picture it was like she was giving me a lot of the strength that she possessed; letting me know that it was going to be OK.”
After a battle that began in June 2014 when she was diagnosed with Stage 4 neuroblastoma, on March 25, 2015, a doctor told Still that Leah was in remission following many difficult treatments.
“Daddy, did I beat up cancer?” Leah asked that day.
He could finally say, “Yes.”
“Since the day she was diagnosed with cancer, I always dreamed about and thought about the day when I could tell her that she ‘beat up cancer,’” says Still. “There were a lot of times during that whole ordeal that I thought that I would never be able to tell her that. For me, it shows the power of not giving up, because if we would have given up when the cancer spread all over her body, than we would have never gotten to the point … where she was cancer-free. So, to be able to tell her that all her hard work paid off was amazing.”
Leah continues to fight to make sure she is healthy and remains in remission. And just like she had the strength to lift up her dad when he was worried, the strong young lady now works to help uplift kids as they go through a battle that she knows all too well. She and her dad visit other children with cancer through the foundation she helped create.
Devon himself knows the sacrifices that families have to make as they help their children fight. The foundation helps families cover needed expenses as they put their children through treatment.
The foundation recently helped a family that relocated to Houston because they could not get the treatment they needed in Hawaii.
“The dad had to give up his job, the mom had to give up her job, and they had a total of six kids,” Still says.
Because they had no income, their car was repossessed, and they had to take public transportation to the hospital for treatment.
“That is dangerous when you have a child battling cancer, because once you go through treatment you don’t have an immune system; you have to try to stay away from germs as much as possible or you are putting your life in jeopardy,” Still says. “So, we decided to go ahead and pay their car off so they wouldn’t have to stress…
“Just to see [the mother’s] reaction, and knowing that we were able to take care of that part of her life so she could focus on her son, that was more of a blessing to us than to her, I think,” Still says.
Devon and Leah Still
Currently, the foundation is working with families from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children in Philadelphia, Nemours/Alfred I. duPont Hospital for Children in Wilmington, and Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston. Still hopes to expand their efforts to include Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center soon.
The foundation will hold the fourth annual For Our Children Gala in Philadelphia on March 28; it will correlate with Leah’s five-year in remission date. Sponsorship opportunities and tickets are still available.
“We are trying to blow our number out of the water this year, because we are really celebrating her fight and her making it to the five-year mark, but I want to do it in such a way that we are supporting families battling cancer and they can get to this mark too. … We are going to be a big resource to help them get there,” Still says.
All those lessons he learned at Penn State made an impact on Still. He only wishes he had started the fight sooner.
“You don’t want to wait until it is too late. Because it took for me to have my child be diagnosed with cancer to really know what families go through, and I just feel like I should have done more while I was at Penn State,” he says. “Of course I did THON and I took families around the football field to show them a day in the life of a football Penn State player, but I never sat down to hear what a day in the life is like for a family battling cancer until I was thrown into those shoes. And maybe if I had done more when I initially found out about childhood cancer, we could have been further along in resources and in research; it would have been an easier path for my child.”
Still sure is doing it now, working to make it easier for those whose experience he now knows well. Learn more about the foundation’s efforts at stillstrongfoundation.org.
Karen Walker is a freelance writer in State College. Vincent Corso is a staff writer for Town&Gown and The Centre County Gazette.
