Sheridan’s Jack Wood Named State’s Top Volunteer Over Age 50

Courtesy: Kathleen Wood

AARP Wyoming named Sheridan resident Jack Wood as its 2024 Andrus Award Winner on Monday. The award is named after AARP Founder Dr. Ethel Percy Andrus and goes to the state’s top volunteer over the age of 50.

Wood will be formally honored at a banquet during AARP Wyoming’s Volunteer Summit at the UCross Ranch on October 2.

“This is very exciting and I really appreciate the award,” Wood said Monday. “I don’t volunteer for the awards. I do it to give back to a community that we really love. I had so many people reach out and ask about the nomination for this award and then ask how they could vote for me. That was humbling.”

The finalists for the 2024 Andrus Award included Patricia Naumoff of Star Valley Ranch, Cheyenne’s Bryce and Pam Freeman, as well as Wood. The final vote to determine the Andrus Award was held measuring social media activity, as well as an online vote. Wood collected 60% of a tight vote.

A Life Dedicated To Service in Sheridan County

Wood is well known around Sheridan County circles, especially when it comes to the Pink Link fundraiser and early cancer detection efforts. For Wood, the inspiration to volunteer to promote cancer screenings and early detection comes from a very genuine place. Jack and his wife, Kathleen, lost their daughter to cancer in 2016. Since Dana Marie Wood death just months after her 45th birthday, the Woods have devoted their time and money to helping those in the Sheridan County area fight the dreaded disease.

“When I lost my daughter I started donating to early detection programs like the Pink Link Cancer Screening Fun Run,” Wood says. “Now, we also do fundraisers like the Pink Link Night at WYO Rodeo. We sell pink hats one night at the rodeo and that money goes to fund cancer screenings.

“I’ve also written letters to the Legislature to encourage their funding of early detection and I’ve paid for advertisements for early detection efforts on television. It’s just something I am very passionate about.”

In 2016 Wood joined the Sheridan Chamber of Commerce Ambassadors. The Red Coats, as they are known, work to welcome new businesses to the community through ribbon cuttings, and tours. The Red Coats also run the Boot Kicking Contest (a contest to see who can kick a cowboy boot off their foot the furthest) during the WYO Rodeo.

The day after Thanksgiving, Jack and his wife, Kathleen, don the costumes of Santa and Mrs. Claus for up to four hours as they take part in the Sheridan Christmas Stroll Parade and then meet with children.

“We average over 500 kids per day,” Wood says. “The smiles on the kids' faces when they meet Santa is gratifying. The kids bring letters to Santa and we read and listen to the kids’ letters. My wife joined me as Mrs. Clause this year. Before that my cousin was Mrs. Clause for the last 45 years.”

Wood is just as comfortable in front of a grill as he is at a ribbon cutting. In 2019 at the request of his son-in-law, Justin Chase, Wood donated his time and money to the Sheridan Softball Association making and selling breakfast burritos at an adult slo-pitch softball tournament. The money went back to the softball association to support future events. While Wood lost his son-in-law to COVID a few years back, he remains behind the grill for the cause. This year, Wood made and sold over 100 breakfast burritos and grilled from 7am until the final out was made each night cooking a few hundred hamburgers and hot dogs at the Justin Chase Memorial Softball Tournament.

When not grilling, ribbon cutting, or promoting early cancer screenings, Wood is also a member of the Sheridan AARP Community Action Team. If things go his way in November, Wood will have another volunteer gig - City Council member. Currently, he is one of four candidates running for three open seats on the Council. Wood has been before the Council previously lobbying for funding for the Goose Creek Transportation effort - transit program for older adults run through Sheridan’s Senior Center.

While not a Sheridan native, Wood has known Sheridan for most of his life. Wood’s father, moved to Sheridan in 1932 and while Jack was born in California, Wood says his family made routine trips to Sheridan to see family. Wood spent 40 years in the trucking industry before moving to Sheridan in 2008. He got a job in the coal mines and retired for one month at age 65 after his daughter’s passing before going to school to get his real estate license and later his associate broker’s license.

“This is just the place we feel very comfortable and we never want to go back to California.”

Jack’s wife Kathleen nominated her husband for the Andrus Award. Jack said he appreciates her nomination, but he wouldn’t be able to win the award without her help.

“In everything I do, she is right there with me,” Wood says. “She is doing all the volunteer work I am. We are a team.”

The Finalists
Patricia Naumoff 
Star Valley Ranch’s Naumoff is a wedding and event planner and finds time to volunteer between eight and 15 hours a week in the area. Abbey Morales nominated Naumoff and says despite living in a small, secluded part of the state, Naumoff’s efforts to bring together the community through fundraisers and events is inspiring.

Naumoff’s list of volunteer efforts is impressive, starting with Rev It Up Girls (Women of Worth), an Etna-based program designed to empower women veterans, women with disabilities or debilitating diseases, or other women who face life’s hardships. The group believes all women should have the opportunity to experience a winter or summer motorized backcountry adventure and leave their troubles behind. In addition to taking women on these adventures, Naumoff is the former president of the organization and helped Rev It Up Girls to raise over $14,000 for The Turning Point, a Lincoln County program which supports victims and survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault.

Last year, as Vice President of the Festival of Trees Fundraising event, Naumoff’s efforts contributed to over $16,000 being raised to combat food insecurity in the Star Valley region. Festival of Trees' fundraising efforts got a boost as matching funds meant each dollar raised became $14 when spent through the area’s food banks.

Naumoff’s volunteer work with the Sno-Skippers snowmobile club has led to her being named the Wyoming State Snowmobile Association’s Female Snowmobiler of The Year. Naumoff also works with the service club Top of the Rockies in Alpine. The organization was founded to bring together people with similar interests to raise money for the community and support family-oriented activities. The Alpine chapter specifically is dedicated to conservation and care of the responsible use of public lands.

Pam and Bryce Freeman of Cheyenne
For the past 40 years, the names Pam and Bryce Freeman of Cheyenne have been synonymous with youth agricultural education in Southeast Wyoming. Pam has been a 4-H leader in the community for 41 years, while Bryce has been a leader for the past 35. The Freemans volunteer with Wyoming’s Future Farmers of America, acting as cooks at FFA’s state camp, and conventions, as well as the Blue Jean Ball. Pam was a five-year member of the Laramie County Fair Board, and both have acted as Laramie County Fair Superintendents for animal and static exhibits. Pam is a two-time recipient of the Presidential Volunteer Award through the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).

During the COVID pandemic the Denver Stock Show went on a brief hiatus leading the Freemans to develop a safe regional alternative for both students and adults to show their livestock. Since its inception in 2021, The Cheyenne Livestock Expo has become an annual event in Laramie County handing out over $100,000 in cash and prizes in 2023.

The Freemans do not limit their volunteer work to students. The Freemans have been board members and club members of the Cheyenne Kiwanis Club, in addition to volunteer and board efforts for Needs, Inc., a Cheyenne-based food pantry. The two were Girl and Boy Scout leaders in the community, softball coaches, have volunteered with junior olympic shooting and run the Laramie County Progress Show, a junior livestock show they run with their extended family and volunteers.

About the Award
The Andrus Award is named for AARP Founder Ethel Percy Andrus and is AARP’s most prestigious and visible volunteer award. It recognizes individuals who are sharing their experience, talent, and skills to enrich their communities in ways that are consistent with AARP’s purpose, vision, and commitment to volunteer service, and that inspire others to volunteer.

The award recipient will be announced in early fall and the winner and their family invited to an award ceremony in Sheridan as part of AARP Wyoming’s annual volunteer summit.

AARP Wyoming Andrus Award for Community Service nominees must meet the following eligibility requirements:

• Nominee must be 50 years or older.

• The achievements, accomplishments, or service on which the nomination is based must have been performed on a volunteer basis, without pay. Volunteers receiving small stipends to cover the costs associated with the volunteer activity are eligible.

• The achievements, accomplishments, or service on which the nomination is based must reflect AARP’s vision and purpose.

• The achievements, accomplishments, or service on which the nomination is based must be replicable and provide inspiration for others to volunteer.

• Partisan political achievements, accomplishments or service may not be considered.

• Couples or partners who perform service together are also eligible; however, teams are not eligible.

• Previous Andrus Award recipients are not eligible.

• This is not a posthumous award.

Past Winners

• Sheridan’s Judy Hayworth was AARP Wyoming’s 2023 Andrus Award winner after volunteering all over her native Sheridan County. At The WYO Theater Judy is an usher, a ticket, taker, and cleaner of the theater. As a part of the Sheridan Memorial Hospital’s Auxiliary, last year she helped decorate 18 Christmas trees located at the hospital, as well as medical clinics; helped with mailings for the hospital, such as Christmas cards; and helped plan the annual five year old birthday party. As a volunteer in the Sheridan Memorial Hospital’s surgical waiting room, she gets coffee, makes calls on behalf of the families at the hospitals, and even brings goodies. As a volunteer for CASA, Hayworth is assigned to work with children from the time they enter the legal system until they are, hopefully, reunited with their families. That means being a friend, a lunch partner, a sports fan and a source of strength.

• 2022 AARP Wyoming Andrus Award Winner Bernadette. “Bernie” Horst is a familiar face around Albany County, volunteering at The Albany County Library, The Wyoming Women’s Club; the Laramie Plains Museum, and Wyoming Women’s History Museum. Horst is perhaps best known for her work at the Eppson Center, where she remains active at the Eppson Center where she volunteers to update the grounds of the center by doing landscaping and decorating tables according to a monthly theme. For ten years, Horst has been a member of the Home Delivered Meals, delivering warm meals to those who are homebound or not able to cook for themselves. The University of Wyoming’s St. Paul Newman’s Center benefits from Horst’s efforts as she bakes snacks for students as they study for finals, contributes desserts for some Sunday night dinners St. Newman’s hosts for students.Horst also volunteers with the Laramie Women’s Club, The Wyoming Women’s History House, and PEO.
• In 2021, Torrington’s Paul Novak was named the AARP Wyoming Andrus Award winner for his better than 40 years on the Goshen Care Center Joint Powers Board of Directors. Since joining the Joint Powers Board, Novak has been a driving force in helping Torrington build a 24-unit Independent Living Facility; a skilled nursing home and dementia care unit with 75 rooms; and a 30-room assisted living facility, which opened in October of 2021. An extremely impressive array of care options and housing for older adults in a community of 6,700 residents.
• Don Cushman was the 2020 AARP Wyoming Andrus Award winner. After retiring 15 years ago, Cushman took a trip to Mississippi with the Presbytery of Wyoming to help repair homes damaged by Hurricane Katrina. That experience led Cushman to make a commitment to work more consistently with Habitat for Humanity in Teton County. Cushman began driving the 55 miles each way, often twice a week (4,500 miles) to build sites in Teton County, which has culminated in its current effort, a five-year, six-building run. He has been named the Turnkey Award - given to the volunteer with the highest number of volunteer hours on a project - numerous times, and was named Habitat’s Lee Kuntz Volunteer of The Year Award winner for the Rocky Mountain Region in 2016. 

• The 2019 Andrus Award winners, Karen and Walter Jones, spend their retirement years volunteering with the National Park Service in Grand Teton National Park. For four months out of the year, the Jones’ live in their camper and devote their time to ensuring that the visitors of the park have a fulfilling and educational visit. Their duties with the park include talks about bear safety, animal information, and cultural history. They can be found answering questions at the desk or out on the hiking trails.

• When the rules committee was making up those rules, it almost seems they had 2018 Andrus Award Winner, Kay Bjorklund of Thermopolis, in mind. Well into her 90’s, Kay remained a Chamber of Commerce Ambassador, welcoming new businesses to Thermopolis, as well as program director for her Kiwanis Club, lining up speakers for the club’s twice-monthly meetings. One week a month you can find Kay delivering Meals on Wheels to Thermopolis residents. Each weekend she is acting activities director for The Pioneer Home, where she lines up Wii Bowling tournaments and shuffleboard. Kay would also mention she carries a 231 average on Wii bowling. If that isn’t enough, she also volunteers one day a week in the gift shop of the hospital in Thermopolis, and works with the doorstep ministry of her church.
• Clayton and Gloria Jensen were honored as winners of the 2017 Andrus Award by AARP Wyoming. The Jensens are the coaches at the Casper Boxing Club in Casper where they have gained a reputation for changing the lives of at-risk young men and women. The mission of Casper Boxing Club is to promote sportsmanship, responsibility, integrity, loyalty, and individuality through education, dedication, desire, and a commitment to maximize excellence. The program seeks to use the mind and body as a catalyst to bring about change, creating an environment to reach youth who others may have written off as unreachable.