A nurse tends to a donor at a Red Cross blood drive at the
Hastings City Auditorium in this July 27, 1989, file photo.
Then: Throughout much of the past century local volunteers have made American Red Cross blood drives in Hastings successful.
Tribune articles from as far back as the 1940s proclaimed specific blood drives as successful after several dozens of pints were donated.
According to those past Tribune articles, as well as research done in the American Red Cross Omaha office, drives first occurred at the Hastings Elks Lodge, 500 N. Denver Ave.; followed by the Hastings City Auditorium, 400 N. Hastings Ave.; the Hastings Red Cross Chapter, 415 N. Kansas Ave.; the Knights of Columbus Hall, 114 E. Third St.; and currently take place every Thursday at the First Congregational United Church of Christ, 2810 W. Seventh St.
Now: Mike Sidlo is one of the donors who has contributed more recently to the amount of blood given in Hastings.
Sidlo, now a 59-year-old assistant engineer with Hastings Utilities, began donating shortly after his 19th birthday. He followed the model of his father Albert, who donated as long as Sidlo can remember.
"It didn't hurt or anything and it really didn't bother me and it was a way to help people and the Red Cross," he said. "So, I stuck with it for a while, donations started to mount up and I just kept doing it."
To read more, see Friday's Hastings Tribune or the Tribune e-edition.>>>
