The Community Partnership Fund – The Community Partnership located in Rolla, Mo., established this fund to promote awareness of community needs and to work together with citizens and organizations to achieve better results for children, families, and communities. This is  a component fund of the Meramec Regional Community Foundation.

Council of Churches Investment Fund I – This fund will hold long term monies for the Council of Churches.

Council of Churches Investment Fund II – This fund will hold immediate funds for the Council of Churches.

Council of Churches Investment Fund III – This fund will hold funds with a 2 to 5 year time horizon for the Council of Churches.

Fair Grove United Methodist Church – Burnie and Emma Belle Huff Fund – Fair Grove United Methodist Church established this fund to hold a planned gift from the Huff family.

Forget Me Not Fund – Amy Hernandez and the Forget Me Not Ball committee established this giving circle fund to assist with their efforts to raise money for the Alzheimer’s Association. This is a component fund of the Community F of the Lake.

Owensville Area Capacity Building Fund – This fund will support projects and programs that enhance the quality of life in the Owensville area. This is a component fund of the Meramec Regional Community Foundation.

Ozark Foster/Alternative Care Higher Education Fund – Alex and Cathy Primm established this scholarship fund which will assist students who currently are or have been in foster or alternative care pursue higher education. The scholarship is for the CFO’s entire service area.

Vichy Fire Department Fund – This fund will assist the fire department to accept charitable donations and hold short term monies. This is a component of the Meramec Regional Community Foundation.

Wyatt’s Fund – Sam and Missy Frink established this fund to support autism spectrum and/or sensory integration disorders for the Gasconade County R-1 School District. This is a component fund of the Community Foundation of the Hermann Area, Inc.

Community Foundation of Southwest Missouri Capacity Fund – This fund will give our Community Foundation of Southwest Missouri affiliate flexibility to support community projects.

LRHS Project Graduation 2016 Fund – This fund will distribute to the Logan-Rogersville Education Foundation to support Project Graduation Class of 2016.

LRHS Project Graduation 2017 Fund – This fund will distribute to the Logan-Rogersville Education Foundation to support Project Graduation Class of 2017.

Springfield Community Sports Development Program Fund – This fund will help develop Olympic training programs and facilities in Springfield.

Jerry and Sharon Berkstresser Fund – Becky Berkstresser Brill established this family and community fund to honor her parents and help simplify her charitable giving. This is a component fund of the Community Foundation of Southwest Missouri.

Dignity Now Endowment Fund – This is a fund which support the long terms needs of Dignity Now. It is a component fund of the Community Foundation of Taney County and is a new Agency Partner in the social services category.

O’Day Family Mausoleum Maintenance Fund – John Baldwin O’Day has established this fund which will distribute to the City of Springfield for the public beautification and historic preservation of the O’Day Family Mausoleum located in Hazelwood Cemetery. Should the available to spend be more than the City of Springfield needs for this task, the remaining available amount will granted to Ozark Greenways for the maintenance and improvement of the greenway trail network in Springfield-Greene County.

Ozark Actors Theatre Endowment Fund – This fund will support the long term sustainability of the local theatre in Rolla, Mo. It is a component fund of the Meramec Regional Community Foundation, and is a new Agency Partner in the arts category.

Skyline R-II Youth Empowerment Fund – This fund will support youth programming. This is a component fund of the Douglas County Community Foundation.

Bixler Foundation – David and Julie Bixler established this family and community fund to assist with their personal giving.

Bluebird Gardens Charitable Fund – This corporate fund was estalsihed by Charlotte Wiggins, manager of Bluebird Gardens, to assist with the charitable giving. This is a component fund of the Meramec Regional Community Foundation.

Brell Family Charitable Fund – Dr. and Mrs. Brell established this fund as part of their estate plan. Upon their passing, it will distribute per their wishes with 20 percent staying at the CFO for children’s healthcare needs and to other child-related charities in Springfield/Greene County.

The Dustin Scholarship Fund – Bailey Simpson established this scholarship fund to assist students in the foster care system pursue a post-secondary education. Bailey is 16 and is a Central High School student. She plans to fundraise toward the $10,000 goal.

Healthy Half Pints Fund – This fund will begin a pilot program to provide kindergarteners and first graders at four elementary schools with an afternoon milk snack. A joint effort by CFO, Musgrave Foundation, North Point Church and the Pendleton Family Foundation.

Kansas City Chiefs Joplin Recovery Fund – This corporate fund allows the Kansas City Chiefs to make grants to organizations helping to support Joplin tornado recovery efforts. This is a component fund of the Community Foundation of Southwest Missouri.

LakeExpo.com Charitable Fund – Brent Simpson, owner of LakeExpo.com, established this corporate fund to help simplify his company’s charitable activities. This is a component fund of the Community Foundation of the Lake.

Rieder Family Fund – Larry & Kathie Rieder established this family and community fund to assist with their family’s giving. This is a component fund of the Stockton Community Foundation.

“He was just gone”

The Tornado’s Wrath Claimed Will Norton, But His Legacy Survives

As Mark Norton lay broken in a crowded, chaotic operating room, Dr. Rex Peterson leaned in close to tell him the morphine supply was depleted and he was going to experience more pain than he’d ever known as the surgeon prepared to re-set the bones protruding from his left leg.

But it hardly compared to the even more exquisite pain a week later when Pastor Aaron Brown had to lean in again at Mark’s hospital bedside in the pre-dawn hours to tell him his son Will’s body had been positively identified after a frantic week of friends, family, strangers and search teams looking for the popular Joplin teenager who vanished into the twister.

An aspiring director whose career was kickstarted with more than 2 million views of his prolific YouTube videos, Will Norton was headed to a prestigious film program at Chapman University near Disneyland. He’d traveled to 34 states and 15 countries, and was learning to fly. His tennis team went to state finals and he went to leadership programs like Boy’s State; he was just at one in Washington, D.C., when Bin Laden was killed and he joined the throngs outside of the White House.

“He was always just a great kid to be around. He made good choices, he never gave us a moment’s worry,” Mark says. “He was a good student. He volunteered his time. He made friends easily because he was real considerate.”

In what became one of the most dramatic stories in the tornado’s aftermath, TV viewers, newspaper readers, Facebook and Twitter users the world over would follow the search for Will that began on May 22 with  father and son driving home, toward a party waiting for the new Joplin High School graduate. After the ceremony at Missouri Southern, Mark had sent his wife, Trish, and daughter, Sara, ahead and said he’d ride with Will. The blaring storm sirens had stopped; radio reports said weather was hitting Carl Junction to the north and they were heading south.

They were about five blocks from home, when the initial throes of the EF5 engulfed Will’s Hummer H3, the sturdiest of vehicles, his parents thought, when they’d considered a car for Will. The pressure blew the windows out as they pulled over near Schifferdecker and Sunset  to hunker down, Mark’s arm pressing against his son.  As Will prayed aloud, the storm’s rotation raised and rolled the Hummer, and his seatbelt snapped. When it landed and the blackness cleared, Mark was pinned inside battered, but conscious. Will was gone.

“I called for him and he didn’t answer,” Mark says. “You think life’s kind of over at that point. You pretty well know you’ve lost your son. I didn’t know if my house was destroyed, too. I was having problems breathing. I can’t even say I was afraid to die, even though I thought I was going to. You look over and your son’s gone and that’s all you can think about, really.”

A stranger soon found Mark and rescuers arrived with the Jaws of Life to free him; they applied a tourniquet to his ripped arterial bicep, stapled his torn scalp and loaded him into an ambulance. The paramedics stopped to pick up more storm victims, eight or 10 in all, as dazed survivors helped push debris from the path they cut around downed power lines and through residential yards.

Sara, who returned to the University of Arkansas this fall as a senior studying finance, had been on the phone with Mark as the storm hit the car. She thought she knew about where they would be as the celebration became a search party. Mark’s sister found the car two or three hours later and it was hours more before Trish and Sara found Mark, by then in surgery at Freeman Hospital. When they finally saw him in recovery, Trish fainted.

Mark’s initial fears that Will couldn’t have survived being sucked into the swirling debris gave way to a semblance of hope in the following days blurred by more surgeries, morphine and hazy consciousness. Searchers scoured the massive debris, tracked leads, and checked hospital logs across several states, buoyed by various descriptions of a young man, without ID or unconscious, who might have been admitted or transferred at one distant hospital or another. Anything seemed plausible in those surreal first days. They even dredged several private ponds near the area where Mark and Will had pulled over and the SUV eventually landed, about 300 feet apart.

On day five, the debris having settled in the water, they dredged once more; this time they recovered a young man’s body, identified via dental records as Will Norton. A cousin serving as the family’s contact called Pastor Aaron Brown, who left for the hospital to tell Mark.

Mark recalls a later conversation where he tried to explain to Pastor Brown the loud, clear, but unusual mix of prayers, scripture and praise he heard Will reciting as they roiled in the storm.

“There have been one or two other instances of that from other families,” Brown says. “I think in those moments something supernatural began to happen. God wanted to reassure family members that it’s okay, he’s with me and I’m real and I want you to have hope.”

___

Joplin High School teacher Kristi McGowan, who spoke at Will’s memorial service, says he had a maturity and empathy uncommon in a typical teenager.

“He always thought about the other person and that’s what was so neat about Will,” she says, recalling how he’d pick up donuts for class, bring his car around so kids wouldn’t get wet in the rain, take food to a classmate who was sick. “He always wanted everyone to have their moment. That’s why everybody was his friend. I had him in class twice a day for a whole year and never heard him say anything negative. Never did I hear Will Norton speak a bad word about anybody.”

She also admired how much he appreciated his close family, speaking highly of his parents, eager to talk about family vacations. “He lived a full life. With Will, there were just no regrets.”

For the memorial service  –  held two weeks after graduation day – Mark was able to leave the hospital in a wheelchair, and then go home to continue healing his 15 broken bones, torn and infected scalp and bicep injury.

“I didn’t have internal damage like so many people did,” says Mark, who returned to his job as manager of the Great Southern Travel office in Joplin on July 1. “It was all structural. Compared to what a lot of people had, I really wasn’t that bad.”

On his way home from the service, he got his first look at the devastation to his native Joplin. It shook him, he says, to compound his family’s personal tragedy with the enormous scale of the community’s loss. Still, he is resolute about Joplin’s future.

“It’s fortunate that not more people died when you think about it,” he says. “It could have been thousands. When you look at the complete devastation of these homes, I don’t know how anybody in that path could really survive. But yes, Joplin will be back – no doubt.”

And, in a sense, so will Will. The Nortons attended an August ceremony at Chapman University where a presidential scholarship was named in his honor. Another scholarship fund established through the Community Foundation of Southwest Missouri, Inc., will help other aspiring Joplin media students. The Facebook page set up to track his search still has more than 50,000 followers. Donors are supporting the Humane Society and Samaritan’s Purse in his name. More than 87,000 have watched his sister and best friend Sara’s perspective of the tragedy on YouTube.

“Nothing’s going to replace him, of course, but it helps to know these are things Will’s going to be proud of,” Mark says. “He’d want us to continue to find ways to help and give back.”

The Nortons’ friends, family and faith help sustain them.  As Pastor Brown says: “They are grieving deeply, but they also are able to see the good that has come about through this.”

Mark describes Trish, whom he married 25 years ago in October, as taking things one day at a time while planning to get back into volunteer work and possibly teaching: “She cried every day just when she found out he was going to go 2,000 miles away to school.”

“The good news is we don’t have regrets,” he says.  “It does help knowing that he knows we loved him. We told him that every day. We tried to protect him. We bought him the safest car we could think of … but he was only meant to be here 18 years. It’s just that the kid had so much future and he’s not being able to finish up life like he could have done here on earth. You always have these questions of why. It’s not our job to question why; it’s our job to have faith.”

Memorial  Scholarship

The Norton family established the Will Norton Memorial Scholarship Fund to honor their son. The first scholarship will be awarded next spring to a Joplin senior interested in pursuing Will’s passion for a career in film, TV or media.

Anyone interested in supporting the scholarship fund can donate online at: www.cfozarks.org/donate, or by sending a check noted for this fund to: Community Foundation of the Ozarks, P.O. Box 8960, Springfield, MO, 65801.

To learn more about Will’s life and story, visit his sites:

• www.youtube.com/will
• www.facebook.com/findwillnorton
• www.twitter.com/willdabeast

Missouri native Sheryl Crow, who announced recently that she’ll donate proceeds from the sale of her 1959 Mercedes Benz Roadster to the Joplin Schools Recovery Fund, plans to talk about the upcoming auction with fellow car enthusiast Jay Leno on “The Tonight Show” tonight.

The Grammy-award winner from Kennett, Mo., also will is talking to reporters today about her classic convertible at the Peterson Automotive Museum in Los Angeles before her taping with Leno, which airs at 10:30 p.m. tonight on KYTV.

The car also will be on special display at the Museum  from Tuesday through Aug. 7  before it goes to Pebble Beach, Calif., for the prestigious Gooding & Company auction on Aug. 20-21.

Representatives for Sheryl Crow and Gooding and Co., hope additional publicity about the auction will spur interest, and bidding, for the convertible, which underwent a major restoration in 2005 before she bought it.

Crow’s announcement that she would auction the car has already generated interest around the world in the donation and, more importantly, the situation facing Joplin and its schools. Here are just a few of the national and global news sources – in addition to local news outlets from Los Angeles to Halifax, Nova Scotia – to pick up the story:

• Reuters
• CNN
• Haute Living
• USA Today
• Jalopnik (Gawker media)
• The Baltimore Sun
• Autoweek
• The Chicago Tribune
• MSNBC

Several CFO staff members had the opportunity to meet with Crow about the donation when she performed at the O’Reilly Family Event Center at Drury University in mid-July. The CFO and its largest affiliate, the Community Foundation of Southwest Missouri, Inc., have established the Joplin Recovery Fund and 20 other funds now totaling more than $3 million to assist with tornado recovery efforts.

A former educator and now mom, Crow said she selected the Joplin Schools Recovery Fund because she wants to support the District’s efforts to restore its 10 schools either destroyed or seriously damaged in the May 22 EF5 tornado.  Joplin school leaders are working hard to prepare for classes to begin in temporary facilities on Aug. 17.

“I really do believe the future of this country is our kids being educated to the fullest,” she said.

She recalled many tornado seasons growing up in Kennett and said that while she hasn’t been to Joplin, she’s followed the story since the toll of the tornado, which now has claimed 160 lives and more than 8,000 homes, first became evident.

“The stories of the devastation are also the stories of people coming together,” she said.

The most recently established funds are outlined below. You can also view a full list of Joplin tornado-related funds or a comprehensive list of Joplin fund donors.

School Supplies for Joplin Kids Fund – The News-Leader established this fund to provide school supplies for Joplin students.

Forest Alumni Relief Fund – Forest Institute established this fund to assist alumni who have been affected by disaster, specifically the Joplin tornado at this time.

Cable One Joplin Tornado Relief Fund – Cable One established this corporate grantmaking fund to assist them with their fundraising efforts for the Joplin tornado relief.

City Pointe Beauty Academy Charitable Fund – The City Pointe Beauty Academy will host the H.E.R.O. (Helping Education Rebuild Opportunity) program to raise funds for Joplin Public Schools, Martin Luther School and St. Mary’s Elementary School to assist with tornado relief.

Project JOMO Fund – Russel Jay Gehrke esablished this fund to disburse to Missouri Enterprises to help Joplin community members who do not have the financial resources to be able to install storm shelters in their homes.

Friends of the Joplin Parks Fund – Joplin Parks and Recreation established this fund to use for tornado recovery and other parks’ needs as well.

Kiwanis Club of Ozark Empire Disaster Relief Fund – This giving circle fund was established by the Kiwanis Club of Ozark Empire to accept charitable donations for disaster relief. For now, grants will be made to assist Joplin tornado relief.

Joplin Schools Recovery Fund – This organizational capacity fund as part of the Joplin R-VIII School Foundation will assist the school district in its rebuilding efforts.

Lucy and Tae-Jin set up a lemonade stand near their homes in New York City to raise funds for Joplin tornado and Japan tsunami relief efforts.

As we launch a new section of our website dedicated specifically to our involvement in Joplin’s recovery efforts, it seems like an appropriate time to share a sampling of the notes we’ve received with contributions that have come in from nearly all 50 states and several countries.

The new section – JoplinRecoveryFund.org – currently includes the list  of Joplin-related funds established at the Community Foundation, donors to the funds, and other information about the role of the Community Foundation of the Ozarks and the Community Foundation of Southwest Missouri, Inc.

As the Joplin-based committee determines the process for distributing these funds, information about future grantmaking opportunities and grant awards will be included.

These excerpts from some of the notes we’ve received show the support and sympathy from those moved to contribute and express their faith in Joplin’s future.

Please accept my small donation for the people of Joplin. May God bless them, give them courage and know that many in our great nation hold them in our hearts and in our prayers.

Beverly
Sharon, Mass.

This past weekend, my son, Tae-Jin, and his good friend, Lucy, (Kindergarten students at PS 110 in New York, NY), decided to raise money by selling lemonade on the streets of Manhattan to help kinds in both Joplin, Mo, and the country of Japan that were impacted by the recent natural disasters. Please find enclosed a check for $45 which represents half of the money raised from their lemonade sales. They are hoping that the money can be used to help kids in Joplin.

Neelesh
New York, NY

This money was tips I earned playing at a coffee house in Voorhees, N.J., to help in any way needed.

Lore

I believe in these hard times if every American or household could make a small contribution for the citizens of the devastated zone of Joplin we will make a stronger “America.”

Alex
Caguas, Puerto Rico
(Sent to CNN’s John King, who forwarded to the Joplin Recovery Fund)

People of Joplin – Our hearts and prayers are with you – One Day at a Time!

Mick and Becky
Springfield

EaglePicher Employee Fund: I hope the community is strengthened by the outreach of others who are able to support them with donations, hands-on assistance and love as lives are rebuilt. May God bless the souls of those who did not live through this tragedy.

Linda
Houston, Texas

Since my father didn’t want anything for Father’s Day, I am sending you this check in his name, Jim Johnson, from Willow Springs, MO.

Betty
Universal City, Texas

Trees for Joplin! An important goal in the restoration! Happy to participate in my small way.

Miriam
Springfield

In lieu of birthday presents for my daughter’s 25^th birthday this week, she asked that donations be made to help the people of Joplin.

Emil and Carla
Jupiter, Fla.

At St. Louis County Government, we recently collected funds to aid Joplin tornado victims. Please accept these donations from our employees.

Stephanie Bauer, Public Information Coordinator

City of Joplin: Wish I had more to spare. Maybe the enclosed $5 will buy a box of cereal for a shelter – same tragedy here 5-11-53.

John
Waco, Texas

(Sent to Ryan Seacrest at “American Idol”)

Dear Ryan: Great show, great season. If you guys are able to do a show in Joplin and Tuscaloosa this summer the people in these cities can certainly use the morale boost and the donations. Contact a couple of my neighbors to see if they will join you – Jon Bon Jovi and Bruce Springsteen.

Paul
Rumson, N.J.

Leggett & Platt Tornado Fund: I have been to Joplin and Carthage and therefore have a bit more of a feel than most people who are seeing the area through the media. In any event, there is no real way to amply express our feelings as to what transpired. Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone affected.

Kenneth
House of Adjustments, Inc.

I am so sorry about the tornado that hit Joplin yesterday. God bless your town – 5-23-11. Love you!

Faith
Hobard, Okla.

I am making this donation to the Joplin Recovery Fund in honor of the QI Department at St. Raphael’s Hospital in New Haven, CT. The devastation suffered by the Joplin community is horrible and we will all continue to pray for all of you as you grieve andtry to rebuild and heal.

God Bless,
Mary

I recently was widowed – my husband was a wonderful carpenter – wish I had more to give – hope this little amount will help. Thank you for coming to the aid of these families.

Jackie
Shepherdsville, KY

We trust this contribution will be used to do whatever necessary to restore some normalcy to this area of our country.

Ralph A. Rockow
Exodyne, Phoenix, Ariz.

The News-Leader established a new fund with the CFO – “School Supplies for Joplin Kids” – for its effort to collect donations from June 19 through July 22. A $20 donation will provide Joplin elementary students with the school supplies they will need for the coming school year, plus a backpack, with 100 percent of the funds going toward the project.

Joplin has 1,100 elementary-school students who were affected by the May 22 tornado.

“After looking at the various aspects of recovery, the News-Leader team identified the need for school supplies later in the summer as an important project that we knew our readers and the community would support,” remarked Linda Ramey-Greiwe, News-Leader President and Publisher.

Donations to the fund can be made online at www.cfozarks.org/donate, or by sending a check to: Community Foundation of the Ozarks, P.O. Box 8960, Springfield, MO, 65801. Please make checks out to:  ”School Supplies for Joplin Kids” or note that in the fund/program box for online donations.

As a coalition of regional community foundations visited Joplin today to begin learning how charitable donations can best help rebuild the community, U.S. Bank underscored its commitment to that process by presenting a $50,000 check to the Joplin Recovery Fund.

“We’re here to focus on the mid-term and long-term recovery of our community,” said Clifford E. Wert, U.S. Bank Region President.

CFO President Brian Fogle said this donation addresses both the mission and approach  that the community foundations want to take in developing philanthropic resources for the long recovery ahead.

“What we need are funds that are flexible and allow total local control,” Fogle said. “We’re all in this together; we’re all here to help.”

Tulsa Community Foundation CEO Phil Lakin, Jr., said he wanted to visit so he could share Joplin’s story with donors in his region interested in helping the city rebuild after the storm that killed 139, destroyed about 8,000 homes and destroyed or seriously damaged about 400 businesses.

“We were quick to step up because we know we need to support our neighbors to the east,” Lakin said.

The Tulsa Community Foundation, the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation and the Community Foundation of Southeast Kansas joined the CFO and its Joplin-Carthage affiliate, the Community Foundation of Southwest Missouri, Inc., for a meeting with Joplin leaders before the check presentation.

The foundations, which will shepherd charitable donations toward a community-based recovery grantmaking group, met with Joplin Mayor Mike Woolston, City Manager Mark Rohr, and representatives from the Joplin Area Chamber of Commerce, the United Way, the COAD group, and the Economic Security Corp. More than $600,000 has been raised thus far.

The group discussed other areas of Joplin’s non-profit sector that also should be represented on the recovery committee and listened to some anticipated needs and ideas. Some of the ways the philanthropic resources can be used is to fill gaps for non-profits that aren’t covered by insurance or FEMA aid and to leverage other resources such as matching-grant requirements. The committee’s first role will be to further define its guiding principles in deciding how to allocate these charitable dollars in the months and even years ahead.

“We have all the flexibility you need and we’re going to be here for the long haul,” said Michelle Ducre, the CFO’s staff associate in Joplin.

Donations to the Joplin Recovery Fund can be made online at: www.cfozarks.org/donate; or by check to the Community Foundation of the Ozarks, P.O. Box 8960, Springfield, MO, 65801. Please note “Joplin Recovery Fund” in the fund/program box online or on your check.

The CFO/CFSWMO has committed 100 percent of the Recovery Fund to Joplin’s rebuilding. Donations are tax-deductible to the fullest extent allowed by the IRS.