Sunday, January 9, 2011

Wisconsinites still aiding beleaguered Haiti, chronicling quake's aftermath


From Wisconsin-

Bill Nathan had gone up to the roof of the St. Joseph's Home for Boys in Port-au-Prince, to ring the bell for evening prayers, as he did daily. But on this day, Nathan says, he "felt the call" not to ring the bell, so he didn't.

Then the earth began to shake and the building collapsed, launching Nathan, the home's director, into a 75-foot fall, bouncing on the way down off a tin roof that probably saved his life. He landed on his back, breaking ribs and cracking vertebrae, but he survived.

Two floors below, three Lutheran ministry students were playing cards in a room where boys in the home's touring dance troupe rehearsed. The three were in Haiti to give theology instruction to pastors and lay members of the Lutheran Church of Haiti. They were staying in the home's guest house and planning to leave for the countryside the next day.

When the building began to shake, Renee and Jonathan Larson were able to escape without serious injury, but Ben Larson - Renee's husband and Jonathan's cousin - was not.

In the chaos of the massive earthquake that reduced much of Haiti's capital to rubble a year ago, claiming more than 200,000 lives, the story of what happened at St. Joseph's might have held the most significance for people in Wisconsin.

More here-

http://www.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/113146889.html

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