Wilton Bulletin
Kick for Nick sending 450 soccer balls from Wilton to children overseas

Aug 10, 2007

More than 10 volunteers spent the day Sunday signing 457 donated soccer balls with Pfc. Nick Madaras%u2019 name and packing them for shipment to Iraq and Afghanistan. From left, Chris Madaras, Bill Madaras, Richard Creeth and Ken Dartley deflate the soccer balls for shipment. %u2014Jeff Yates photo

More children in Afghanistan and Iraq will soon have soccer balls to kick around after more donations from the Kick for Nick campaign reach their destinations. This past weekend, the committee for Kick for Nick prepared the 425 soccer balls for shipping. (On Thursday the number had grown to 457 soccer balls.)

“We thought we would not collect that many,” said Ken Dartley, a committee member. “We kept having to take some out to make room,” in the net in front of the American Legion on River Road.

This is the third time the Kick for Nick campaign collected soccer balls to send overseas. The campaign was set up following the death of Pfc. Nicholas Madaras this past September while serving in Iraq. Each soccer ball shipped has Pfc. Madaras’ name written on it, and each box of balls has a biography of him, “so those receiving the balls will know of Nick and his contribution to bringing peace and freedom to their country,” Mr. Dartley said.

The latest collection started in the middle of June. Mr. Dartley said he wasn’t sure of everyone who dropped off balls, but it included a group in Long Island, a group in Weston, the Wilton Soccer Association and the Wilton Fire Department.

Sixty soccer balls were donated by the father of Wilfredo Perez of Norwalk. These balls were collected at a recent fund-raiser in honor of Specialist Perez, Mr. Dartley said.

Specialist Perez was killed by a grenade thrown from a window of an Iraqi civilian hospital he was guarding in Ba’qubah, Iraq. He died on July 26, 2003.

To date, the Kick for Nick campaign has collected 1,025 soccer balls. Mr. Dartley said he thinks the reason the drive has been successful is it’s “in memory of Nick and part of it is to connect with children over there.”

Storage Deluxe in Wilton donated the boxes the balls are going to be shipped in, Mr. Dartley said. The organization Support Our Soldiers, in Groton, gave the campaign money to ship the supplies. And the U.S. Postal Service in Wilton will pick up the boxes.

The campaign has contacts in Iraq and Afghanistan where the balls can be delivered and distributed. They have been looking for someone serving in Bosnia to help coordinate the distribution of soccer balls to that region as well, he said.

Mr. Dartley said he thinks there will be another drive at the end of the year, but wasn’t sure as of Monday morning.

“I didn’t think we would last this long,” he said.

© Copyright 2007 by Hersam Acorn Newspapers