Senior companion Herstine Ferguson, 85, devoted to people and community
posted on Wednesday, July 12, 2023 in
College News
WATERLOO — Herstine Ferguson moved to Waterloo in 1957 and has been active in the community ever since.
Ferguson, 85, is one of the recipients of a Courier Eight Over 80 award for making a difference in the community and positively affecting anyone who has come into contact with her.
She said she didn’t tell anyone about her nomination, except one person, because she didn’t want to “toot her own horn.” That person was a 103-year-old woman that she is a senior companion for through Hawkeye Community College.
Ferguson has been a senior companion for 15 years. Over her time volunteering, she’s worked with five other seniors who have since died. She does things such as running errands with them and playing games. She plays cards everyday with her companion.
“I love people and it’s something I always wanted to do,” she said.
She also keeps up with five or six former colleagues from Powers Manufacturing Co., where she worked for 30 years – retiring in 2002.
At the company, she worked in the cutting room, where she would recut clothing with flaws. She worked with basketball and football uniforms for many schools, but mostly East and West high schools.
She had the opportunity to work on special jerseys, including cutting University of Iowa basketball player Chris Street’s jersey. The jersey was commemorated after the junior died in a car crash in 1993.
In addition, Ferguson worked Len Bias’ jersey. A basketball player for the University of Maryland in the 1980s, Bias was the second overall pick in the 1986 NBA draft and was selected to play for the Boston Celtics. Two days after being picked by the Celtics, he died as a result of a cocaine overdose.
Although it was intensive hand-worked labor, Ferguson loved her time at Powers.
The staff “was like family,” she said. “(The boss) could’ve said ‘I can’t pay you.’ I think we would have still went in because that’s how nice he was.”
Though retired for more than 20 years, Ferguson stays involved in the Waterloo community.
She’s been on the Jesse Cosby Neighborhood Center’s board of directors for more than 10 years. There, she exercises, learns “how to work her phone” and sews. She is also hoping to restart a choir even though she confessed she wasn’t a good singer.
Ferguson also hosted a radio show on the Waterloo’s African-American owned public radio station, KBBG FM. From 1 to 6 p.m. on Sundays, she played gospel music for listeners.
Even when she was “too busy,” her love of people overcame her attempts to limit herself. One day when visiting Northcrest Specialty Care, she was sitting down, smiling, and an employee asked her to be a greeter.
“I said, ‘No, I’m doing enough,’” she recalled. “I came home for two days, and I called him up. I said, ‘yes.’”
Apart from greeting, she also visited the residents who loved her.
“I’m passionate for older people,” Ferguson explained, as well as for her own family.
Born in Mississippi, she moved to Waterloo in 1957 to follow her sister, Lillie. About 10 years later, she met her husband, Oma, at a bar she frequented. The two never had children of their own, but raised three grandkids together. Oma died in 1999.
“He was a sweetie pie,” she said, remembering him fondly that he called her “kitten.” “People used to call me Mickey. He didn’t like that.”
Ferguson now has eight great-grandchildren and five great-great-grandchildren. The youngest is about a month old.
In her spare time, she continues her tradition of bowling at Maple Lanes, which she’s done for 50 years. Her league restarts in August. Her old average was 256 but Ferguson didn’t share her new average, except to say it was “much lower.”
By Maria Kuiper, Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier
Tags
- 8 over 80
- Senior Companion Program
- Waterloo Courier