Ladies’ Aid
The Ladies Aid celebrated 90 years in May of 2022 ~~
The Ladies Aid meets the first Wednesday of each month.
Twenty ladies of our congregation and Rev. Voight met at the parsonage on May 25, 1932 to organize an Aid. A constitution was adopted and signed by 26 charter members:
The afternoon meetings were held at the members’ homes until the completion of the new church’s basement. Meeting times were changed to evenings when more women began working outside the home.
The Aid served all funerals, weddings, and anniversaries before the serving groups were formed.
However, deli-ham sandwiches have replaced the farm-fresh egg salad and home-canned meat sandwiches. Egg coffee is also a tradition that has been lost throughout the years.
The Aid has always donated all profits to either church or mission projects. A few of the donations include $1,000 in 1948 towards the new church’s altar and pulpit, a piano in 1949, the light behind the stained glass window above the altar, the stained glass “Resurrection Morn” window, the Lutheran and American flags, shelving in the church library in 1994, vinyl flooring in the teacherage in 1997, and meeting room tables in 2006. Cash donations to the school library fund and to various mission projects are made each year. In 1998, membership dues went from $0.50 to $1.00 per month and members were no longer required to pay $0.01 for each year of her age during her birthday month.
Serving mission festival dinner, Easter breakfast, ice cream social, and Ascension lunch are long standing traditions. Hosting an appreciation dinner for the Immanuel staff at Christmas is a recent addition.
Since 1972 the Aid has provided special keepsake baptismal napkins to infants baptized in our church and since 1974 has sent postcards to visitors who sign the guest book. The Aid also maintains the church library and makes greeting cards available at a nominal price.
Although food and craft sales and quilting bees no longer are held and homegrown vegetables and eggs are no longer given to the kitchen at Martin Luther College, the Aid sponsors church-wide food shelf collections for MLC and McLeod County.