Nolin To Chill On D.Q. Roof For RIley Hospital

Winona Lake Dairy Queen owner Jerry Nolin will sit atop the business’s roof Wednesday and Thursday to raise funds for Riley Hospital for Children and Kosciusko County Riley Kid’s Fund through the Kosciusko County Community Foundation.
Business partners Alan Alderfer and Mike Bergen established the fund to benefit Riley and to help assist area families served by the children’s hospital. Alan’s daughter, Katherine, and Mike’s son, Ben, both have received medical care from Riley.
It will be Nolin’s third year sitting on the roof to raise funds.
Nolin will give $1 of every Blizzard sold on Wednesday and Thursday to Miracle Treat Day, benefitting Riley. The remainder of Blizzard sales on those two days will go to the Riley Kid’s Fund.
Miracle Treat Day is a national effort on Thursday where funds from Blizzard sales will go to Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals.
To help raise funds for Miracle Treat Day, customers have had the opportunity to purchase paper balloons for $1 and write their names on them, which are then displayed on DQ’s walls. Customers then get $1 off a medium or large Blizzard or $1 off a chicken strip basket.
Pre-orders will be accepted on larger orders of Blizzards and can be called in today through Thursday at Dairy Queen at 574-267-2315. People can call in the size and flavor they want.
“This year’s goal is to raise $10,000, and the first year $6,200 was raised for the Miracle Treat Network. I decided to help raise funds for a local organization last year and $10,600 was raised last year for the Community Foundation’s Riley Kid’s Fund,” Nolin said.
Nolin will sleep on the roof in a tent and get down only for restroom breaks and to eat. He said the first year he was delivered food using a fire truck ladder.
He said the first year he was on the roof it rained, and last year it was hot.
“I woke up on the first morning the first year and there was half an inch of water on the roof and my blankets were soaked from dew, and the train blew its horn at 4 a.m.,” Nolin said.
He said that has not stopped him from continuing to sit on the roof.
“We have over 400 kids in this county who go to Riley Hospital and I have a family member who goes there, and Alan and Mike have kids who have gone there,” Nolin said.
He said his favorite memory was during the first year when a woman with an older car searched through her front and back seats and gave him all the change she had.
“She said that was all the money she had and wanted me to have it, and told me her granddaughter went to Riley,” Nolin said.

(Story By The Times Union)